


the wind, the leaves

by orphan_account



Category: Shingeki no Kyojin | Attack on Titan
Genre: Anal Fingering, Anal Sex, F/F, F/M, M/M, Minor Injuries, Past EreJean, Possibly Inappropriate Playing of ABBA, Praise Kink, There's some stuff about smoke and noise bombs in case that bothers anyone, Waffle King Armin Arlert, blowjobs!, gratuitous usage of italics, he's got like two lines tops, name's marc, non-binary Hanji Zoe, there is ONE oc in this story
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-12-22
Updated: 2015-12-22
Packaged: 2018-05-04 17:28:46
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 33,648
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5342426
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/orphan_account/pseuds/orphan_account
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Eren stared into his hot chocolate for a moment before pulling the key out from under his shirt and over his head. He put it on the counter for Levi to examine. </p><p>“I can open doors with it,” Eren said proudly, as if this answered all of Levi’s questions. However, he took the hint from Levi’s grimace that it was an insufficient explanation. “Any door,” Eren continued. “As long as I can find it. I can step through buildings, cities, sometimes countries if I find the right door. I can walk through time, too. Those are different doors, though, and I use them sparingly. There are a few other people like me. Or so I’m told. I’ve never met anyone like that, though. I figure if I keep walking through doors I’ll run into them sooner or later.”</p>
            </blockquote>





	the wind, the leaves

It was a crisp and foggy morning, the kind where you can feel autumn holding its breath in anticipation of the first snow. It was early on November 25th, and Levi Ackerman had just quit his job. In three days, it would be Thanksgiving. And in thirty days he would be thirty years old. He ruminated over this in his apartment kitchen, quiet except for the gentle hum of the _Joe Hisaishi at Budokan_ album playing from his computer where he was reading the _Sina Times_. Levi met his own eyes in the reflection of his black tea and sighed. Today was Levi’s first Monday* without having to go into the office. Without having to pick up coffee and the daily newspaper for his bosses. Without having to wake up every day to his favorite song (sometimes the only thing that could get him out of bed. This slowly chipped away at the song being his favorite, and he was sick of it). 

He decided, with glee, that he would go on a walk despite having already gone on his morning run. Today he would make the most of the sudden change of pace—enjoy the fresh air he was denied at the office. 

Levi _did_ plan on going back to work, though. He’d been checking the paper and online, for something he was qualified for. And he didn’t mind if it _were_  office work. Just something—anything—different from before. He needed a sort of a vacation, so he gave himself a week before he would even begin considering his options. All he knew was that he needed out of that place immediately; he could feel his soul eking out of his ass every time they asked him to stay just a half hour longer, which usually turned into two hours or more. There was simply nothing there for him.

The only thing that was maybe bothering him was the distant looming beast of extensive unemployment—what if he never found a job where he was happy? What if it ended up being just like his office job? What if he couldn’t find work? What if he had too much free time? 

He shook off the ennui and clambered into his boots, taking care to lace them tightly and evenly. He pulled on a warm black peacoat and a pair of black gloves, then added a plaid evergreen scarf to flourish. He checked to make sure he had everything he needed; keys, wallet, phone, and the bag with the muffin he planned to eat wherever he stopped on his walk. He gave the apartment three once-overs and locked the front door and headed for the Preserve near the complex.

The Preserve was a neglected piece of land, with a small budget designated to it by the municipal government and its premises a little overgrown due to the lack of Parks and Rec workers available to devote their time to actually preserving it. There was a sign that said it was a Preserve, that included details concerning its founding and unique foliage, but most thought of it as “the woods,” and took to carelessly dumping their garbage and making out in Jeeps in its environs.

Not to say that it was dirty or unwalkable, by any means. There was a well-worn path that wound throughout the Preserve and looped around, so where you walked in was where you walked out, no matter which of the three trails you took. Levi had walked all three before, but the first trail on the left was his favorite.

Walking on the left-side trail took you through a canopy of alder trees that entangled their branches together above the path. When the trees were full of bright green leaves in spring’s full-swing, it felt like walking through a fairy tunnel, Levi thought. Even in nearing winter, a few persistent golden leaves clung to the alders like garlands of tinsel. Eventually, the trail led to the center of the Preserve, where an enormous red madrone wrestled with the surrounding evergreens. 

Levi hummed softly, relishing the wet _swish_ of his boots in the damp leaves underfoot.

When he came to the madrone, red and bare, trembling in the cold breeze, he was surprised to see someone else in the Preserve. Rather, he had heard them before he’d seen them; it was a man. He was singing a jazzy melody in a language Levi didn’t understand. He looked much younger than Levi, and he figured he was probably a student at the local college. Under his mess of brown hair, Levi could see that the man was gazing up at the crown of the madrone with a glazed look in his eyes, more like he was looking past the tree and deep in thought. Levi thought he was handsome. From where he was standing, it appeared that he had taken the far right trail.

The man nodded amicably when he noticed Levi’s presence. He stopped singing. 

“Morning,” Levi responded, admiring the sole madrone and her evergreen neighbors, their pine branches extending toward hers. He closed his eyes for a moment, inhaling the scent of the damp soil and dead leaves; he could smell a distant fire.

When he opened his eyes, the man was gone.

Levi turned around and decided to take the right-side trail out of the Preserve. He wondered how the man had walked away so quietly earlier. Levi was pretty sensitive hearing-wise, and was not prone to missing things like that. He must have been utterly enveloped by the bouquet of November.

When he reached the entrance of the Preserve, he still couldn’t seem to shake the nagging malaise. He saw a city bus leaving the block, and wondered if the man was on that bus. For some reason, he wanted to know more about him. Strangely, he had a feeling he would see him again.

 

* 

 

Levi got back to his apartment and started the kettle boiling before anything. Feeling warm from the brisk pace he had taken, he peeled off his coat and hung it on the rack adjacent to the door. He tossed his keys onto the key tray on the counter, and pulled his wallet out, his muffin wrapper, and his phone to check the time—where was his phone? Shit—he could’ve sworn he’d had it a second ago. He checked the other pockets in the coat, felt along the lining to see whether or not there were any holes. He found nothing. With a swear and a sigh, he pulled on his coat and scarf back on to head out and find his phone. 

Except before he could turn the knob, there was a knock at the door.  

Levi stood on his tip toes to peer through the peephole. It was the man from the forest (Levi was seeing him again a lot sooner than he expected). He was wearing a worried look on his face and holding Levi’s phone in his left hand. Levi pulled away from the door and paused a moment before stomping his feet lightly, making it sound like he was walking and certainly _wasn’t_ standing at the door right as the man had arrived.

Opening the door, the man smiled, wearing a look of genuine pleasure at having helped someone out. From this close, Levi could see his bright green eyes sparkling. The pure joy on his face affected his features in such a way that made him look especially handsome. He held the phone out to Levi with both hands. Levi was very taken aback by the situation, and wasn’t quite sure what to say.

“Thank you,” he managed, although it sounded a bit like a question. “I was just about to go out and look for this. Where did you find it? I mean, where did I drop it?” As he spoke, Levi realized that the only way the man could have known where Levi lived was that he had followed him home. He was almost certain that his phone didn’t have his address in it anywhere. The man hadn’t been standing close enough to pull the phone from Levi’s pocket, either. Maybe he had taken it when Levi’s eyes were closed? But in the case of the man just following him home, why hadn’t he simply called out to Levi on his way back? 

The man continued to smile, looking at Levi and Levi’s phone intermittently. 

“Uhm, my name is Levi,” he stammered, trying to fill the silence. "How did you know I lived here? If you had followed me back, why didn’t you just call out to me?” Levi voiced his concerns, his tone a little more firm. This was a strange situation that he intended to straighten out. The man’s smile started to fade into a sort of troubled look, listening to Levi intently. “Why aren’t you talking?” Levi cleared his throat, wondering if the man was deaf and he was just being an asshole. “Can you hear me?” But didn’t he hear the man singing, perfectly on key at the madrone? He recalled the song to be in a foreign language. “Can you understand me?” Levi was about to give up when the man gestured to his throat and ears. As he did this, Levi noticed the daintiness of the man’s hands—long, slender fingers, with delicate cuticles and well-trimmed fingernails. After pointing at his ears he gave a thumbs up, but after pointing to his throat, he made an “x” with his forearms as if to say “out of order.” Around his neck was a leather string that had some sort of charm at the end of it. Levi nodded, sort of understanding, but curious to know more about this stranger.

“What if I gave you a notepad—could you write down—“ Before Levi could continue, the man waved goodbye, almost a _see-you-later_ swish of his fingers, and started down the stairs. There was a black Camry at the side of the road that Levi had not noticed before. The man got in the back seat on the passenger’s side of the car, with one last wave to Levi before the car drove off.

 

*

 

Levi had plans for dinner with his best friends Hanji and Erwin that evening—they were going to celebrate the end of his woeful time at the office. The three of them were friends as children, later working together throughout their teenage years and college at a bookstore before splitting up to pursue careers in their respective fields after graduation. Thankfully, their jobs hadn’t taken them out of the city.

Erwin picked Levi up at 7:00 on the dot. Levi had had the entire day to contemplate his morning and whether or not he should tell anyone about it. 

Getting into Erwin’s car, he was greeted by the upbeat tune of Franz Lehar’s _The Merry Widow_. Levi’s mood, previously in a strange limbo, settled in to the familiar peace of the presence of his best friend listening to classical music.

“How’s unemployment?” Erwin asked lightheartedly, putting the car into drive and executing a rapid u-turn.

“I can’t tell. Not counting the weekend, it hasn’t even been twenty four hours, yet,” Levi quipped. “How's employment?” Erwin pulled a face.

“Today was a train wreck. One of our interns got into a bicycling accident on the way to work today, and the reports she’d drawn up were in her backpack. Her backpack got run-over—totally shattered her laptop. She’s in a coma at the hospital downtown,” Erwin explained.

“Christ,” Levi said.

“If she hadn’t been wearing her helmet, the doctor said she’d be dead. But not having those reports set us back pretty badly, especially since the long weekend is coming up—we figure we’ll ask her for the digital copy when she wakes up,” Erwin added, empathetic yet business-concerned as ever. He worked in a high position at a law firm—Levi supposed he had to be. He never really had to think about the things Erwin did. He decided to change the subject. 

“What’s Mike up to these days?” he asked, evoking a smile from Erwin, who flashed Levi the back of his left hand where a thick, shiny silver ring with a single diamond set in it sparkled intermittently as the headlights on the highway passed them by.

“Shut the fuck up!” Levi said, slapping Erwin on the shoulder repeatedly. “Shut the fuck up!! When!?”

“Yesterday morning. Oh my god it was so fucking cheesy, Levi. I woke up and it was on my finger, and I was like ‘what’s this?’ and Mike goes, ‘a promise’. Can you believe that?!” Erwin gushed, laughing.

“Yes, I can,” Levi said, smirking, recalling Mike’s unexpected but genuine passion for romantic gestures. “Did you cry?”

“Like a baby,” Erwin added softly.

Levi asked Erwin about a date for the wedding and said he had no idea, but he was thinking sometime in August next year.

“Would you be my best man?” Erwin asked, pulling into the Bella Notte Trattoria parking lot and into a space near the entrance.

“Do you even have to ask?” Levi replied fondly. 

“I do. Because I don’t want to upset Hanji; I’m going to ask them to be the Hanji of Honor. The both of you right beside me."

“They’ll fucking love it,” Levi cackled, getting out of the car. They walked inside and Hanji was already at their usual table near the stage, waving excitedly and pointing to something on their phone.

“Erwin, Levi!! Jesus you two have to watch this video—holy _FUCK_ what the _FUCK_ is that,” Hanji shouted, pointing to the ring on Erwin’s finger, also earning a few stares from the other patrons (but not the staff). Erwin outstretched his hand to show off the ring and the air was electric with excitement. “When!?”

“Yesterday!” Erwin told them the story as they sat down and their usual order of drinks arrived. Levi smirked into his drink, feeling remarkably stress-free at that moment. 

“Wow,” Hanji said after Erwin had asked them to be the Hanji of Honor. “I have an eponymous job? Wow,” Hanji marveled, staring past Levi and Erwin and probably into another plane of reality. “I’d would be truly humbled, Erwin. Of course I’ll be your Hanji of Honor.” They embraced and Levi was so overwhelmed with nostalgia he let himself get tugged into the group hug, let himself laugh a belly laugh. 

“Anyway, what was that video you wanted to show us?” Erwin asked, munching on the crisp bruschetta that had just arrived to the table. Hanji ate an entire bruschetta whole and struggled with which task to execute—chew, talk, or pull out their phone. The result ended up being a messy melange of all three, but nothing was clear until Levi barked at Hanji to chew and swallow.

“Sorry,” Hanji said, swallowing, though not really sorry. “Did you hear about the earthquake in Rose City last night?” Erwin and Levi nodded, having read the _Sina Times_ that day. “There was some sort of explosion a few minutes after the tremors subsided, and someone recorded it! It’s insane,” they said, scrolling quickly on their phone.

Hanji sat in the middle of the booth, so Erwin and Levi squeezed close together and craned their necks down to watch the video. The video was shaky and medium quality after having been passed around on so many websites. It was dark around the edges of the frame, but everything from the sky-rise view of the phone user was illuminated by a distant but large, eerie orange fire. The person filming was muttering a string of disbelieving curses. 

“ _…So I’m in the Red Rose Tower right now, we just felt the earthquake. No one’s hurt up here but it was noticeable enough. Then we heard and explosion and here we are. Someone mentioned that the Mariana is over in that direction, but I can’t see how_ —“

The narration was interrupted by a flash of blinding white light and a speaker-shaking blast a few seconds after. “ _Holy shit, oh my god_ ,” Distressed screams and voices could be heard in the background noise of the video. “ _Honey, we gotta get out of_ —“ Again, the person was cut off by an even bigger white flash and louder boom. The video ended a few seconds after that.

“Jesus christ,” Levi gaped.

“Wild, right!” Hanji exclaimed before Erwin and Levi could manage to comment.

“Did they figure out what caused it?” Erwin asked. “The article from this morning said they were still investigating.”

“Unverified sources say that it was some sort of chemical explosion. Boy, if I were rich, I’d fly right over and investigate it myself. Dust for prints and all that,” Hanji chuckled. Hanji worked as a coroner, but was formerly a forensic investigator for the city police. They often reminisced about field work, but were definitively banned from doing any after a near-death accident. It was “too ironic,” Hanji would complain. Now they were near death all the time.

“Makes you wonder,” Erwin mused. “There seems to be a whole other world beside the one you know, right?” As Erwin said this, Levi recalled the man from that morning, feeling as though Erwin’s words described his appearance perfectly.

“Yeah,” Levi agreed. Hanji and Erwin leaned in, knowing there was more behind Levi’s agreement. Their food arrived and Levi started on his fettuccine.

“Come on Levi, there’s clearly a story here. Don’t leave us hanging,” Hanji pleaded.

“Don’t _Levi_ us hanging,” Erwin made a pun. Levi threw a crouton from his side salad at Erwin.

“Something weird happened this morning,” Levi began. He didn’t really know how to continue, so he just talked. About the madrone, the man and his clear voice, and then how he’d suddenly disappeared. How he brought his phone back, although Levi could have sworn he’d had a hand on it the whole time. And then how he didn’t speak but maybe Levi could understand what he was _trying_ to say. His friends looked rapt; Hanji was holding a forkful of their shrimp scampi for a solid two minutes before taking the bite.

“That is definitely weird,” Erwin agreed. Levi was thankful he wasn’t alone in these feelings.

“I just. Wanted to know more, you know? Maybe it’s weird. He seemed friendly enough,” Levi shrugged, thinking out loud.

“ _That’s_ normal,” Hanji said. “With all the spare time you’re going to have, you’re bound to ask weird questions and think in different ways than before.” They took a bite of their garlic bread. “Like what if this weird kid was just some figment of your imagination? I mean, clearly he wasn’t, because he brought you back your phone. That’s the proof. But if you hadn’t seen him again after the madrone, could you really have believed that he was real? And since he is real, what would it be like to know him? You heard him singing but he can’t talk? Maybe he’s got some sort of disconnect with the two things. Music and language are different enough, I suppose. Maybe he walks between the world we know and the one we don’t, like Erwin here was suggesting—singing in one, talking in another.” Hanji was rambling, and although Levi would sometimes tune them out, he listened intently. Anything to get closer to the truth of the stranger with the lucid green eyes and steady singing voice. He felt drawn to them.

For some reason, Levi noticed two people walking into the restaurant, waiting at the front counter to be seated. When the host hurriedly returned to the counter, he grabbed two menus and gestured to a table near the front window. Although their conversation was not audible from where Levi was, the couple shook their heads and pointed to the stage, insinuating they would require a good view of tonight’s performance. (which began at 9 each Monday and Saturday evening—Levi checked his watch—they still had a half an hour). The host nodded and led the two to small table not far from Levi’s table.

One was a woman who had what Levi assumed were Japanese features—she sort of resembled his Grandma Tomoko in her steely dark eyes and her shoulder-length straight inky black hair. She was dressed per the requirements of the restaurant; business formal. The man she was with was about her height, skinny with his pale blonde hair pulled into a small ponytail. He wore a blue suit and a tie with a quirky pattern on it. It reminded Levi of the tacky, wobbly motif on Dixie Cups. 

“So Levi, do you know what you want to do next? Still looking at office work?” Erwin asked. “I could probably finagle you into bookkeeping at the firm,” Erwin offered. Levi shook his head.

“I sort of want to get away from accounting and numbers right now. But it’s really the only thing I’m good at, so I’m not sure how long the feeling will last…” Hanji and Erwin scoffed.

“…The only thing he’s good at, do you hear this?” Hanji said sarcastically. “It just the only thing you’re good at that you’ve _capitalized_ off of, Levi,” they explained, using their fork to demonstrate Levi’s other skills in a list: “You’re good at running; you could be a personal trainer. You love reading; you could start a book review blog and/or work at a library. You have serious talent when it comes to the saxophone—“

“Hanji that was in band in high school—“

“I know when it was, but you almost got that scholarship to Stohess University, remember!  If it weren’t for Andy Harshbarger sleeping with Mrs. Drake—“

“You know that’s not what happened,” Erwin interrupted. “Andy Harshbarger bribed her with free meals at his Dad’s restaurant for life if she gave him her recommendation to the Saxophone Talent Council.” 

“Remember how he used to brag about how it’d be a great story during his Tour to tell his fans about growing up at Harshbarger Hamburgers, going to school with a Harshburger for lunch every day for twelve years?” Levi sighed. “What a shitty name.” Hanji gave a long-suffering sigh and went back to their list. 

“Anyway, you’re also a really good cook. Just open a cafe! You could serve the fancy teas that you drink and entertain with your saxophone on the weekends in the evening until you garner a bigger clientele. Eventually that turns into more people offering to play and you get to sit back and enjoy the interesting life of a cafe owner, meeting all sorts of unconventional folks and stressed out university students.” Levi did feel better after Hanji listed out the things he forgot he was good out. _You’re your own worst critic_ , Levi thought. But there’s the rub—did he really want to capitalize on his passions? Wouldn’t that turn them into a job, rather than a hobby? Turn them from enjoyable to stressful? Just like his favorite song as his alarm in the mornings?

As Levi pondered this over his drink, having finished his meal, the lights in the restaurant dimmed and the curtains on the stage pulled back to reveal the entertainer of the evening. Dressed in a grey suit and black tie, sitting at a marvelous black lacquer steinway classic piano, was a young man. His hands hovered over the ivory keys for a held breath, then slammed down and launched into a jazzy fanfare before bringing his lips affectionately to the microphone where he began to croon a smoky love song.

It was the man from this morning.

 

*

 

“That’s him,” Levi said in disbelief. Hanji and Erwin gave him an incredulous look, both setting their silverware down with a clatter. 

“You’re joking,” Hanji said.

“He’s fucking with us,” Erwin accused. But both knew Levi to be a more serious person, and they believed him whether they wanted to or not.

“That’s the voice I heard this morning,” Levi said. “And those are the hands that returned my phone…” Levi trailed, listening to the bright belts and low warbles coming from the man. He glanced to the table where the couple who had asked to be closer to the stage were. The blond man wore a bright grin, gently shaking his head back and forth, looking impressed in a way that he had heard this all before but would never get tired of it. The woman wore a look that was hard to decipher, but her mouth curled at the corners in what was unmistakably enjoyment. The performer’s joy was contagious, and he trilled through an authentic smile. Levi put his drink down. He stood up from the table and went to find Petra and Oluo, whom he had yet to see that evening. Usually they stopped by some time during the intermission of the night’s entertainment, but Levi couldn’t wait.

Petra and Oluo owned the restaurant. Levi had met the two of them through Hanji in college. Oluo’s major was in Culinary Arts and Petra’s in Business Management. They were seated at their usual table in the back near the kitchen. Petra was wearing a red dress that hugged her every curve, supplemented by a matching shade of red on her lips. Oluo had lost his suit jacket, sleeves rolled up—common looks for the respective organized front-of-house and sweaty back-of-house restaurant managers. They waved when they saw Levi and Petra raised her glass of Pinot Grigio to him. 

“Evening,” Levi said, leaning on the outside of the booth. “Who’s the kid?” 

“I told you he had a reason for coming over here,” Petra told Oluo, jokingly berating Levi. “Usually he can wait for _us_ to come to _him_.” She smiled playfully. 

“I don’t mind it,” Oluo said, forever loyal to Levi. “The man’s got his business!” 

“Where did you find him?” Levi pressed, although enjoying the banter.

“He was playing at Erd’s bar, and I asked if I could steal him for a night. The crowd was pretty into him. But I don’t think his style matches the ambiance of Erd’s. Not a critique, just an opinion,” Petra explained. Even if it were a critique, Levi would not have questioned Petra’s impeccable taste. “His name is Eren.”

“Eren?” Levi rolled the name around in his mouth, chewed on it a bit. “Eren. Hmm.” He looked back up at the stage where Eren had stood up and was slamming the keys and belting out a high note and then ended the song by sweeping up the keyboard. He sat back down and the restaurant erupted in applause. Levi hadn’t noticed, but it was a full house tonight.

“Thank you,” Eren said, panting a bit, his forehead glittering with sweat underneath the stage lights. “Thank you very much.”

“Thanks, you two,” Levi said to Petra and Oluo. Oluo just waved, but Petra wore a knowing look as she watched Levi return to the table.

“Who is he?” Hanji asked before Levi had even sat down.

“I think he’s about to tell us,” Levi said, gesturing to the stage.

“Good evening, folks. My name is Eren Jaeger, I’ve been playing piano for seven years now. I really like it,” he explained, taking off his suit jacket while trying not to stray from the microphone too much. “It’s like audible math, you know, sort of in the way a fractal is visual math. What does this equation of keys sound like?” He asked the audience. With one arm in his coat jacket he tapped out an improvised eight-bar tune. He laid his folded coat on the side table that had a cup water on it. After he had drank half the glass, he joked, “Boy, I was hoping that wouldn’t be water. Can’t say I’m that surprised. I don’t really look ' _of age_ ', do I?” Eren used air quotes around “of age” and stressed the words in such a way that indeed made him sound more naive and innocent than he was. “It’s amazing; do you know how much _work_ being 23 is? And then not even getting recognized the privileges that _come_ with being 23? _Unbelievable_.” The audience giggled, yielding to his charisma that filled the room.

“It’s not good for your voice,” Levi heard the woman with the dark hair and steely eyes mutter disapprovingly, not loud enough to draw attention. But Levi had heard it. 

“Anyway. I’ve got a nice program to play for you tonight, but if you have some requests and I can play it, come see me when I break for dinner at 9:45, okay? This next one is a little maudlin, so grab a glass of wine—or maybe two in case you have some repressed feelings, alright?” Eren swung back around to face the piano, his fingers hovering in position for the first notes. “This one is called _You’ve Changed_.”

Eren delved into the lachrymose intro, breathing into the microphone. “ _I’ve an awfully funny feeling, that this thought that’s been a-stealing through my brain is not to be ignored_ ,” Levi watched the keys and his fingers, the way they waltzed together in harmony as if they were two separate and living things. “ _But to really tell the truth, though I’m not a well-known sleuth, I honestly believe that you are bored…_ ” Eren sighed. “ _You’ve changed…_ ” Erwin’s eyes were closed, admiring Eren’s clear voice and emotional performance. Hanji’s gaze switched between Eren _and_ Levi. They had steepled their fingers in such a way that expressed deep thought.

Levi had so little information on Eren. Eren Jaeger. Has played piano for seven years. Looks good with his sleeves rolled up. Is dangerously charismatic, perpetually enigmatic. Delphic, cryptic, elliptical, equivocal. Levi had questions. But he wanted to play the game. Was there a song of some sort he could request that would be subversive and suggestive of his desire to know him? One that was also a jazz song?

Levi was at a loss, but as Eren fell into an instrumental bridge in the song, he turned to see Hanji scrolling through his phone. 

“What are you doing?” Levi asked. Hanji looked immensely concentrated. 

“Looking through your phone,” Hanji stated the obvious.

“Yes, I can see that. What are you looking for? How did you know my passcode?”

“It’s the same as your bank PIN,” Hanji explained.

“How do you know my bank PIN?” Levi felt a little more concerned, although albeit unsurprised. Erwin flashed him a look of sympathy. 

“Did you even go through your phone after Eren had given it back to you?” Hanji asked, sounding disappointed in Levi’s sleuthing instincts (he didn’t really have them like Hanji did). Levi didn’t have to respond for Hanji to know the answer was “no.”

“I’m checking your contacts. Do you know who 'Ricky Midnight' is?” Hanji asked, showing Levi the screen.

“Ah-that’s actually Rico. I was drunk when I added her,” he said. Erwin barked a laugh while Hanji responded with a solemn nod and eyebrow raise. This was all Levi’s drunken antics warranted, he supposed.

“Alright, how about this? ‘Very Cute and Mysterious Quiet Guy’?” Hanji said, showing Levi his phone again with the contact page open.

“That one, I do not,” Levi said, reclaiming his phone. The phone number area code was from out of town. “Shit,” he hissed.

“Send him something,” Hanji urged. “Let’s see what happens,"

He took a deep breath and decided to trust his gut, sending out the text.

**Eren?**

 

*

 

As he sent the text, Eren’s song came to a close. While he let the last note ring, a phone alert sound could be heard from the stage. Levi froze.

“Oh no,” Eren said, sounding disappointed. “Who was _that_? Just kidding, it was me,” he said, pulling his phone out of his jacket pocket on the coat rack. “Sorry, I’m just gonna respond real quick. _Kids these days_ ,” Eren added in an old-man voice, eliciting a laugh from the audience. “It’s my mom!” Levi noticed the couple who seemed to know Eren wearing looks of confusion. Levi held his breath. He had a pretty good idea of what Eren was pulling here.

“Oh I have an idea! Do you guys wanna make my mom’s day? I’m gonna hit the record button—such a fancy little piece of technology—and send her an audio message. On three, could you all please say, ‘you’re beautiful!’?” Eren begged. “She would just love it.” Various tables shouted affirmative statements like ‘yes,’ ‘you play, we text your mom!’, 'fair trade’ and ‘hell yeah!’

“Thanks guys! Okay, one…” Eren held up the phone.

“Two…” He pressed record.

“Three!” The audience erupted with an enthusiastic and unisonous, 'you’re beautiful!’ Hanji and Erwin joined in, looking at each other when they said it. But Levi couldn’t find the words. “Thanks so much folks! You’ll just make her day,” Eren beamed. He tapped a few seconds longer and then held the phone up to microphone so everyone could hear the tell-tale swoosh of the message being sent. “Seriously, folks, thank you. She’s in a different time zone, but I’ll let you know if she responds. This next song is by…” Levi didn’t hear the name of the song title, nor did he recognize the tune that Eren began to play. Rather, he was fixated on his phone having just received a message from ‘Very Cute and Mysterious Quiet Guy.’ He opened it and held his breath as he read it. There was text, followed by an audio message.

**Is this Levi? I think...**

Levi held the phone adjacent to his ear and pressed play.

**“ _Two… three! You’re beautiful!_ ”**

Time seemed to stop.

 

*

 

“Oh my god,” was all Levi could manage. “It’s him,” he said, showing the text to Erwin and Hanji.

“Jesus,” Hanji whispered, incredulous.

“This is either the cutest or weirdest thing I’ve ever heard of anyone doing in order to flirt with somebody,” Erwin mused.

“Yeah, I’d say I’m stuck between those sentiments exactly,” Hanji agreed. Levi stared at the message and listened to the recording again.

“S’fucking weird,” he said. _But I may or may not be smitten_ , he didn’t say. “I’m going to talk to him, when he breaks for dinner.” He stated.

“Ask him if he wants dessert,” Hanji exclaimed and in a small whisper added, “ _and then gesture to yourself_.” Levi gave Hanji a firm push and told them to ‘fuck off.’ 

“I don’t know, Levi,” Erwin said with a shrug, taking a sip of his wine. “He seems like the type that would eat it up.” Erwin did know the type, seeing as he was affianced to Gomez Addams. 

“Seems like the type that would eat _you_ up! Get it, Levi!” Hanji goaded.

“Shh! Shut up!” Levi laughed and came back down to reality. He was actually going to talk to Eren. His friends were going to be annoying about it the whole time, but he was going to do it.

Eren had stopped singing a while ago and was just playing some jazzy licks, his hands and the keyboard waltzing together and apart. Levi was itching for the intermission to begin.

When it finally did, Eren took a quick bow and explained his table location in case folks had requests. As he did so, he introduced the couple who had asked to be sat closer to the stage as his sister and best friend, Mikasa and Armin. The stage lights turned off, the restaurant’s lighting returned to its standard setting, and the restaurant playlist resumed its selection of classical music.

Levi watched Eren use his napkin to wipe his forehead and then dig in to his spaghetti. The man named Armin gave him a pat on the back and beamed. His sister, Mikasa, smiled and asked Eren a question; she gestured to the stage and looked upset. Whatever she asked, Eren refused to answer, shoving his mouth full of spaghetti in defiance.

A few patrons walked by Eren’s table. Some were there to congratulate him, some asking for a song, Eren smiling and nodding _yes, he could do that_ , or the reluctant, _sorry, I don’t know that one_.

“Go over there!” Hanji urged. Levi ignored them. It had to be the right moment.

When Eren had finished eating, he was sprawled out in the booth, ignoring whatever Armin and Mikasa were talking about. As Levi was standing up, Eren noticed his presence. And Levi noticed that he had noticed. Eren, to the dismay of his table mates, grabbed his drink and began walking over to Levi.

“Oh god, he’s coming over, where are we going to talk? Not here at the table in front of you two—“

“Meet him in the middle!” Erwin said in a hushed voice, shooing Levi away. Levi grabbed his phone but forgot his drink and regretted it, but wouldn’t turn around if his life depended on it.

He and Eren eventually closed the distance between the two of them.

“Hello, stranger,” Eren said, smiling around his glass. Levi felt like anything but a stranger, and he gave Eren a look that described fondness. Why was he so drawn to this man?

“You’re not so quiet, are you?” Levi asked, showing Eren the contact information he had entered into his phone. Eren laughed loudly.

“Yes, sorry about that,” he began. “I’m not supposed to talk on days I perform. Gotta rest my voice. That’s what my manager says, anyway. I think they all just want me to shut up.”

“I heard you singing at the madrone, though,” Levi said, not wanting Eren to shut up. “Or was I not supposed to hear that?”  


“Hmm,” Eren nodded. “But you knew who I was when you read the name, didn’t you? When did you notice?”

“About twenty minutes after I saw you get on that stage.” Eren was in the middle of taking a sip of his drink and he almost choked.

“It took you that long?!” he asked. Levi felt a blush creep over his face. 

“It was actually my friend over there that found it. They’re job is literally investigating,” Levi said. Eren was wearing a wide smile, his green eyes sparkling in the lowlight. 

“What’s your job then?” He asked Levi.

“Right now, I don’t have one. I just quit a boring office job. Do you just entertain?” Levi countered, gesturing to the stage.

“I do a lot more than that,” Eren said, voice low, his eyes flickering. Levi’s heart skipped a beat.

“Did you… really mean it?” Levi asked, playing the game. Eren looked uncertain.

“Mean what?”

Levi showed him the message with the recording and he cleared his throat. Eren smiled.

“Well. Of course. You _were_ the intended recipient of that message. Now, listen, my mom was a beautiful lady, but. This one was for you. Why, did you think I wouldn't mean it?” Not at all—Levi thought it was stupidly clever and just wanted to hear Eren affirm the complement in person. And he seized on the word _was_ —this explained the look on the faces of his friends when he said it was a text from his mom on stage.

“Would you like to get dessert or something after this?” Levi asked finally, looking at his feet, then back up to Eren. He’d forgotten how hard flirting was.

“ _Or something_ ,” Eren mused. "I’d be thrilled.” Levi believed him. 

“Nice to meet you,” Levi added, turning around to rejoin Erwin and Hanji. Eren watched him go, sipping at his drink. Reciprocating the movement, he turned to go back to his table.

Erwin and Hanji were wide-eyed and curious.

“What did he say?!” Erwin asked in a hushed voice.

“You looked sexy! Did you say something sexy!” Hanji asked in a less hushed voice.

“We’re going to get some dessert after this,” Levi said. “Or something,” he echoed.

“ _Or something_?!” Hanji raved.

“Get it, Levi,” Erwin said, shaking Levi’s hand.

“Forget the cafe,” Hanji laughed. “Just write Harlequin romance novels.”

Eren took the stage again shortly after his and Levi’s conversation. 

“Alright folks. Delicious food, right? Thanks for giving me a moment to digest,” he said, hanging his coat back up and taking a seat at the piano. “So I get a Michael Buble request almost every time I play, and that’s cool, he’s a cool guy…” Eren continued his spiel, inciting laughter. Then he started to play, sweeping the audience away in a deluge of notes. Hanji and Erwin and Levi switched between listening intently and having quiet conversation about this and that. The bill arrived and suddenly it was 10:30. The restaurant closed at 11:00, and Eren was taking his final bow. There were still quite a few tables, and the applause filled the restaurant up to its vaulted ceilings. 

“Thank you, folks,” Eren said above the acclamation. “You were wonderful.”

He grabbed his coat and hopped down from the stage, grabbing the handkerchief Armin offered, wiping down his forehead and neck. He didn’t bother to sit back down, instead leaning against the booth. His eyes met Levi’s and he gave a nod of his head, gesturing for Levi to come over. 

Levi looked at Hanji and Erwin, who were eating their dinner mints and counting out a tip for the bill. 

“I’ll see you two later,” he told them, putting on his peacoat and scarf, contributing a generous tip onto the check tray. Erwin and Hanji gave him two identical, lascivious looks. 

Eren was missing from the table his friends were at, and Levi looked around for him. He headed for the front door, assuming that maybe he was outside. He appeared at his side out of nowhere. 

“Sorry, just had to grab my jacket. Ooh, I like this,” Eren said, rubbing the material of Levi’s scarf between two fingers. “Nice color on you.” Levi’s head spun and felt like this was all moving rather quickly.

“Thank you,” Levi said.

They walked out together into the cold and misty night.

 

*

 

“So what’s a good place for dessert around here?” Eren asked. “Armin, Mikasa and I haven’t had too much a chance to explore that sort of thing yet,” Eren’s eyes were wide with excitement, glancing around at all the lights and signs in the street.

“Well it’s almost eleven o’clock, so our options are few,” Levi explained. He wanted to take the kid somewhere nice, but everything was closed up except for the bars at this point. The open-late coffee shops were further downtown, too…

“I just want you to know that I am down for pie from Shari’s,” Eren laughed, on the same page as Levi.

“Shari’s it is,” Levi said. “Twenty minutes that way.”

They walked with their shoulders bumping occasionally. Eren asked Levi about his old job and Levi explained why he left. He listened intently to Levi about his original aspirations for the office, falling apart when he realized he wasn’t happy anymore. Levi told Eren about growing up in the city when he asked him. Eren said he was from the middle of the country, some nowhere-town.

Eren started humming some tune when the conversation grew quiet, his fingers twitching on an air piano involuntarily.

“They move when I sing,” he explained when Levi pointed it out. “Can’t help it.” Levi thought it was sweet.

“Why did you start playing?” he asked.

“My mom, actually,” Eren began. His deliberate tone grew soft. “She always wanted to play, but she could never afford it—and then when she could, she didn’t have time. We listened to a lot of classical music at home growing up. She died when I was fifteen,” he sighed, clearly hating this part of the story. Levi bumped his shoulder with his own affectionately, and Eren smiled and continued. 

“We went to live with my Uncle Hannes after that, and he would listen to a lot of jazz. He had this big-ass piano in his living room, and one day I came home and sat down at it with the how-to guide for kids that was always in the bench and just. Starting playing all the time. It was like I couldn’t stop. I learned how to play all those songs my mom would listen to, along with the stuff Hannes liked. Mikasa loved it, I loved it. I got good enough that I could make a buck or two playing at bars. And here I am, having just finished a show, walking with you to the local Shari’s,” Eren said. Levi thought it was a sad story, but Eren had made the most of his situation.

“Now your mom lives on in all your music,” He said quietly. Eren stopped talking after that, but right before they turned into the Shari’s parking lot he said, 

“Yeah.” 

They arrived at the Shari’s, but something was off. The lights. All the Shari’s lights were off. The parking lot was dotted with cars, all dark without drivers or passengers, and the Shari’s looked closed. Sure enough, when Levi cupped his hands around the front door to see in, the drab upholstered booths with brass accents were gone, along with the brightly colored pies and wooden cashier’s lectern. 

“This is so weird,” Levi thought aloud. “Could’ve sworn this place was open just last week.” 

“They come and go so quickly,” Eren said vaguely. Levi felt a little embarrassed until he remembered he’d bought some ingredients for creme brûlée to celebrate being able to actually cook with this newfound spare time. 

“Hey,” Levi said, calling Eren out of his stupor where he staring at the dark Shari’s sign. “I’ve got some stuff for dessert back at my place. How about I just call us a taxi? Or is that… a little weird?” he asked, wondering if things were moving too fast. Eren walked over to Levi and stared at him, half smiling, eyebrows furrowed.

“Are you constipated?” Levi asked him. Eren snorted and laughed like it was the funniest thing he’d ever heard. After he recovered, he said, 

“Haha! No, but I probably look that way. No, let’s go to your place! But hey…” Eren began, putting his hand on Levi’s to stop him from dialing. “We. We don’t need a taxi.” Levi gave Eren a blank look.

“Eren, I’m not walking for an hour in this shitty weather at night. And neither are you,” he said. Eren’s expression did not falter. 

“We don’t have to walk either,” he said. Levi was even more confused than when he first saw Eren disappear from the madrone. 

“I’m afraid I don’t catch your meaning,” he admitted, although pocketing his phone. Eren took both of Levi’s hands in his own and gazed deeply into his eyes, trying to speak without talking.

“Would you trust me?” There was something about the wording of Eren’s question that swayed Levi’s decision. Levi foraged throughout his thoughts why this made such a difference. After a moment, searching Eren’s eyes, he nodded. Eren sucked in a deep, excited breath. 

“Great! Alright. Just stand there a moment while I get situated,” he began, untying his scarf and pulling off his necklace. Levi had wondered what is was—now he could see the twisty shape on the end belonged to a large, vintage-looking mortice key. “Levi…” Eren hesitated. “Would you please close your eyes?” 

Honestly, this is where Levi usually would draw the line. Handsome strangers who play piano? Okay. Ones who flirt with him by texting him adoring lines that he cleverly recorded? A little odd. But esoteric affairs requiring eye-closing and copious amounts of trust? He faltered and searched his own thoughts, hovered on the question of why his common sense alarm wasn’t going off. What did he mean they “didn’t need a taxi”? This sort of ambiguity was against everything Levi stood for. Then he looked at Eren, patient and wholly honest, his big green eyes sparkling in the moonlight, dusting his dark skin with a soft white glow. What was the worst that could happen at the newly closed Shari’s at eleven thirty at night? Every possible answer swarmed his head; yet he quelled the clamor. Somehow, he truly trusted Eren.

He acquiesced, closing his eyes and going as far as covering them with his hands to further placate Eren, who was bouncing in place with glee at Levi’s decision. He could hear him whispering to himself, ‘where is it, now? should be…ah! Here!’ He heard Eren approach him.

“Alright. Give me your hand.” Levi’s cold hand grasped Eren’s burning warm one, and he felt himself be pulled forward. Eren walked him slowly. As they walked, he could smell something like vanilla and the sharp but faint scent of laundry detergent. Levi wasn’t sure if they walked for more than ten seconds (it feels longer when you don’t know where you’re going), but soon they’d stopped and Eren was asking him to open his eyes. 

They were in front of Levi’s apartment complex.

“What,” Levi started.

 

*

 

“The fuck,” Levi finished. He gaped in astonishment. Of all the strange things to happen to him today, this was the weirdest so far. This was seismic Weird. No, this was off the Weird Richter Scale. 

And Levi had seen weird things before. He’s seen strange objects in his peripheral vision when nothing was there at all. He’s had the movie theater to himself before. He once saw Mario Lopez at Disneyland. He’d seen things. But this, much like Eren himself, was something else. He tried to rationalize the situation.

They were standing in front of the Shari’s on Anderson and across from the Bed, Bath and Beyond. Eren asked him to close his eyes. And then they had just suddenly appeared at his house? Was this fucking _Quantum Leap_?

“What just happened.” Levi asked, but it didn’t sound like a question. “Did you put something in my fucking drink?”

“No! Please don’t be mad!” Eren begged. “I’ll tell you how I did it!”

Something in Levi’s gut told him to give Eren a chance. Maybe this would explain his strange behavior from that morning. Perhaps against his better judgment, he choked down the feeling of trepidation he had about the situation and started rifling through his pocket for his house key.

“Well let’s warm up and get dessert started. You can tell me while the creme brûlée chills,” Levi sighed. “Kid’s a pianist, singer, goddamn magician…” he muttered, bitterly. What was he doing?

Eren looked relieved and grabbed Levi’s free hand while he unlocked the door. “Thank you,” he whispered. Levi let him hold onto his hand until they were taking off their coats. 

Inside, Levi switched on the electric fireplace, started the kettle boiling, and threw on his apron, freshly cleaned and ironed that day.

“Wash your hands,” he told Eren, who went straight for the sink without question, muttering an un-ironic ‘ _yes, captain_ '. A pang of fondness bloomed in his chest. He set about getting the cream and eggs and sugar out as Eren settled into one of the stools at the counter, fiddling quietly with his phone. Levi gave him the sticky note with the wifi password on it and a cup of hot chocolate and Eren looked at Levi with wide, grateful eyes, like a dumb puppy—like he would follow him anywhere.

“So,” Levi said, having put the ramekins of creme brûlée in the refrigerator and sat down next to Eren. He nursed a cup of steaming tea. “Tell me your secrets, Houdini.”

Eren stared into his hot chocolate for a moment before pulling the key out from under his shirt and over his head. He put it on the counter for Levi to examine. “This,” he said. “Is a Skeleton Key.”

“Spooky,” Levi said. Eren snorted.

“I can open doors with it,” Eren said proudly, as if this answered all of Levi’s questions. However, he took the hint from Levi’s grimace that it was an insufficient explanation. “Any door, to where ever I want to go,” Eren continued. “As long as I can find it.” Levi was still puzzled. How could one not find a door? Most doors were obviously doors. Unless it was some sort of door for decoration, or a playhouse door. Eren read the confusion on his face and proceeded.

“Any door. There are doors to places you can’t see. I can step through buildings, forests, cities, states, provinces, prefectures—sometimes entire continents if I find the right door. Which means I can walk through time, too. But those are different doors, though, and I use them sparingly!” Eren paused for breath, too nervous to look at Levi.

"There are a few other people like me. Or so I’m told. I’ve never met anyone like that, though. But I figure if I keep walking through doors I’ll run into them sooner or later.” Eren nervously picked at his thumbs, face flushed as he fell quiet. Levi’s tea had cooled off to where it wasn’t scalding anymore (which is how he liked it), and he was unsure of what to say.

“I’m not quite sure what to say,” he said aloud. “But I suppose I am not surprised.” Eren looked dumbfounded.

“You believe me?!” he asked, incredulous; this clearly wasn’t a usual thing. Levi shrugged in dismissal. 

“How else would you have done it?  And there’s really no reason not to believe you, is there? I mean. This morning—oh, yesterday morning, technically,’’ he said, noticing it was just past midnight. "Did you open a door when you left the madrone? When you appeared at my doorstep? Hey, is that how you got my phone?!” Eren looked like he’d gotten caught with his hand in the cookie jar. Bingo. “That’s sweet, that you thought I was cute enough to open a time/space door to find me and slip me your number,” Levi said, only realizing he’d said it out loud when it was too late to retract the statement.

“Well it was all depending on if you’d open yours…” Eren murmured. Levi felt his face get hot. He rapped his knuckles against the counter a few times to break the silence, standing up to pull the creme brûlée and blowtorch out. 

He cleared his throat. “So when did you get that key? How?” Levi started scorching the sugary surface of the first ramekin, coaxing the caramel color out. 

“My mom told me I woke up one morning and it was around my neck. I was probably two or so when it happened. I don’t remember. But I’ve always remembered having it, and I’ve always remembered being able to see many doors. Or. It’s more like I can see their outlines, their keyholes, the light shining under the cracks. Sometimes I have to feel around for the doorjamb, sometimes I run right into the knobs. I’ve got bruises on my legs from them! It’s always been this way,” he explained, stopping when Levi graced him with a spoon and ramekin of freshly seared creme brûlée. “Thank you,” he added, cracking the top and taking a bite. He practically moaned and Levi’s stomach lurched. “Oh my god. It’s _delicious_!” 

“Thank you,” Levi said.

“Seriously!! Mmm, wow, it’s so good—you should open a cafe or something!”

“You’re the second person to tell me that today.”

“Maybe you should listen to us, then! We’ve got some good ideas,” Eren hummed around a spoonful of dessert. He wolfed it down and Levi let him finish his. “Put a piano there and I’ll play for you, too. Cafe goers love pianos, even if only for decoration. You could hang a sign, too! ‘Don’t play unless you’re goddamn Mozart or Eren!’,’ he added. “I can’t tell you how sick of Chopsticks you’d be. It’s the _worst_.” Levi fell quiet while Eren chattered about the future, his insinuation that he would stick around a comforting thought  

“Thank you,” Levi said eventually. Eren wore a worried look. 

“For what?” He asked. Levi didn’t say anything, just watched Eren shuffle about under his gaze. 

“For telling me the truth,” Levi said with conviction. It was the craziest thing he’d ever heard, and the most honest, too. Eren’s face grew florid, and he returned to his dessert. They finished their creme brûlée with small talk, then got to washing the dishes. 

“Hey Levi,” Eren began after drying the last spoon. 

“What is it?” Levi asked, leaning against the sink, arms crossed.

“Could I kiss you?”

“Yes,” Levi breathed, rolling his eyes and pulling Eren in for a kiss under the yellow glow of the kitchen lights.

 

*

 

Levi cupped Eren’s face with his hands and slowly pulled back from their kiss. It was soft and sober and steady. Eren had tangled his hands in Levi’s hair, his fingers moving to massage the nape of his neck. He melted into Eren and they kissed again, this time rough and needy, Levi noting that Eren's mouth tasted subtly sweet from the creme brûlée. They shuffled around a bit, each trying to take the lead in the kiss. Eren asserted himself by lifting Levi onto the counter, standing between his legs. He reached for the buttons on Levi’s shirt when—

“You’re still wearing the apron,” Eren laughed, breathless. Levi apologized and pointedly handed Eren the apron to hang on the rack.

“Please continue,” he said. Eren obliged, kissing each part of Levi’s chest as he unbuttoned his top.

“Holy shit,” Eren swore when he got to Levi’s abs. Taut and unbelievably defined, he mouthed at them, started massaging where Levi’s obliques curved around his waist. Levi leaned back to give Eren more room. It sounded like Eren muttered something like ‘thank you, jesus’ but Levi couldn’t be sure.

As exciting as it was, Levi felt a little useless just letting Eren lick his abs, so he made to sit up. Eren reluctantly pulled away, but Levi drew him closer again.

“Let’s move this to a bed?” he asked. Eren nodded and scanned the room behind Levi, and then picked him up off the counter and set him down with an oof.

“You’re heavier than you look,” Eren wheezed.

“You saw why,” Levi rolled his eyes, pulling Eren by the hand to his room.

“Hell yeah I did,” Eren agreed.

“It’s your lucky day,” Levi continued once they were in his room, taking off his open shirt. “You get to see them again.” Eren eyes flickered in the low light. He mirrored Levi, taking off his button up and singlet. 

“Leave those on,” Eren said, pointing at Levi’s dark jeans. “I’m going to take them off.” Levi’s stomach flipped, but he rolled his eyes so Eren wouldn’t know how affected he was. Seeing the way Eren was watching him, however, he had a feeling it wasn’t the least bit successful.

“Only if you keep the key on,” Levi countered. It was probably weird considering he earned an eyebrow-raise from Eren. But Levi didn’t really care; the key had brought Eren to him.

Levi lay down on the bed, propped up on his elbows, trying to give Eren his best “come hither” look. Eren seemed under Levi’s spell, crawling between Levi’s parted legs and placing a hand on his cheek. They shared a hungry grin before diving into a bruising kiss, rolling over each other. Levi let his hand roam over the globes of Eren’s ass, grabbing a handful and grinding his hips into Eren’s. Moaning against Levi’s mouth, Levi pulled away to lick a line up Eren’s strong jawline, tasting salt.

“You are,” Eren sighed. “Something else.” Levi laughed, really believing Eren was the one who merited such a description. They kissed again, and Eren rolled up and sat astride Levi, starting to wrestle off his jeans, his key bouncing against and tickling Levi’s chest.

“God damn,” Levi puffed while Eren struggled with getting his jeans unstuck from Levi’s ankles. “These were way too tight, weren’t they?”

“Nah, your ass looked great.”

“Oh.”

Eren finally succeeded in the removal of Levi’s jeans; having gotten off the bed to get better leverage, he hopped back on and knelt next to Levi, their faces inches within each other, hot breath mingling.

“I’ve,” he began, tentative. “I haven’t done this in a while.” He searched Levi’s eyes for something, and added, “but I want to do it with you.” Levi felt himself smile and pushed Eren down on his back, nuzzling his neck and trailing kisses down his chest.

“You’re doing fine,” Levi reassured, wondering if Eren could hear how loud his heartbeat was. “I want to do it with you, too.”

He tugged on the waistline of Eren’s slacks, wrapping his fingers under the band, leaving open mouthed kisses on Eren’s abs. Eren’s face was red and flushed. He paused. “Do you want to continue?”

“God, yes,” Eren threw his head back while Levi unbuttoned and took his sweet time removing his slacks. When Levi was done, he traced up Eren’s legs, along the sinews of his calves dusted with dark hair, and pressed his palms into Eren’s hips. Eren looked equal parts nervous and eager.

“Doing great,” Levi repeated, straddling Eren, going in for a kiss and then dodging to go through his side table drawer for lube and condoms.

“Tease,” Eren whined. Levi cupped Eren through his briefs, enjoying the noises Eren was making. Moving his palm up and down, he watched Eren’s elbows wobble under his weight. He leaned down and pulled Eren from his briefs, stroked him a few times before removing his remaining clothing entirely.

Levi rolled the condom on and licked a stripe up Eren’s cock, one hand around the base. Eren threw his head back, making a noise somewhere between laughing and whining. Levi smirked and brought the tip into his mouth, trying to get past the dry flavor of latex. Drawing him further into his mouth, he felt Eren’s fingers gently twist in his hair. Levi sucked hard, smirking around Eren’s cock while his fingers flexed and un-flexed involuntarily, as if he were playing a fast song on Levi’s scalp. He bobbed and sucked, getting into a steady rhythm.

In a daring mood, Levi took his hand off Eren’s dick and took him in his mouth until he felt it bump the back of his throat, almost to the base, swallowing around it and wrapping Eren in wet heat.

“S-stop,” Eren squeaked. Levi pulled off, slightly worried.

“Are you okay?” He asked with a cough, voice raw. Nodding, Eren took a deep, shuddering breath as Levi rubbing little circles into his thighs with the pads of his thumbs.

“I was just. Really close,” he laughed, relieving Levi of his stress. Eren sat up, throwing his arms over Levi’s shoulders, nipping at his neck. “I didn’t want to come yet.”

They fell into another bout of kissing, hands roaming and groping about, trying to touch every part of the other all at once. Falling onto his stomach, Levi let Eren knead his shoulders while kissing his head, his body tingling with pleasure wherever Eren touched.

“Fuck, you’re good,” Levi droned, falling to pieces under Eren’s adroit fingers. “Alright—I have to—do you want to—“

“YesIwannafuckyou,” Eren wheezed. Levi barked a laugh, and threw a new condom at Eren.

“Alright, dope,” he said. “Put that on and I’ll get myself ready.” Eren made a small peep while he fiddled with the crinkly condom wrapper.

Uncapping the lube, Levi rubbed it between his hands, warming it up. With pillows propped up behind him, he leaned against the headboard and took a deep breath, moving his hands down.

Never had Levi seen such a shade of red on the face of a human being. With any other partner, Levi might have been completely uncomfortable at this point. Instead, he and Eren kept unyielding eye-contact while he watched opened himself up, thrusting in one, two, three fingers, slowly stroking himself with his free hand. He felt his breath grow ragged and he tossed his head to the side, unable to hold up the weight, eyes still locked with Eren’s. “God, you’re cute,” he told Eren, whose blush couldn’t get any darker, nor impatience more palpable.

“O-okay,” he panted when he couldn’t go any farther without overstimulating himself under Eren’s heavy gaze. “Come over here.” Eren scrambled over to kneel between Levi’s legs, running his hands up and down them in fascination. “Take a deep breath,” Levi told him. Shoulders visibly relaxing, Eren raked his eyes over Levi, ran his thumb over his hole, pressing firmly on the rim of the muscle but not pushing in. Levi’s breath hitched—he coughed to try and save face. “Whenever you’re ready.”

Eren looked incredibly determined as he lined himself up with Levi and slowly pushed in. Levi tried to keep his head up to watch, but it grew too heavy to support. Leaning against the pillow, he waited for Eren to fully enter him.

“Okay,” Eren huffed, eyes unfocused, overwhelmed with arousal. “Okay. Are you good?” Levi nodded, throwing an arm over his forehead, sticky and damp. Eren was like a match lighting him on fire.

“Go ahead,” Levi whispered. “ _M-move_ ,” he urged when Eren just stared at him. Eren obliged, and pulled back, thrusting in with more force than he probably knew. Lucky for Levi, this wasn’t his first rodeo. The pace picked up as Eren grew more confident, and Levi gave him little pointers and compliments when he could manage to speak.

“Here, let’s readjust,” Levi said, throwing his legs over Eren’s shoulders as the pressure between his hips grew. "Try pushing in toward here,” he motioned. Eren adjusted his angle, thrust back in and— 

“ _A-ah_!” Levi keened. “Fuck,” he gasped. Eren looked a little uneasy as though he had hurt Levi. It was blatant when he realized what happened.

“Was that your—“

“Yes!” Levi hissed. “Keep going, right t- _there_ ,” Their breath and the low, tinny sound of the mattress springs filled the room, sounding impossibly loud. Eren picked up speed, groaning as he slammed against Levi, his key bouncing between their chests. Eren’s hands were searing hot on Levi’s thighs.

“ _You’re beautiful_ ,” Eren hissed, echoing his text from earlier. He moved his hand to cradle Levi’s face, amorously running his thumb and fingers over Levi’s bottom lip. Levi groaned Eren’s name and his lips parted, taking Eren’s fingers into his mouth, his tongue roving over them. “ _Fuck_ —" Having lost control of his mouth, Eren was chanting Levi's name over and over.

“I-I’m gonna,” Eren choked. “Levi!” With a deep and hard thrust, Levi came with a shout when he heard Eren sing his name, seeing stars. Levi’s legs felt like jelly as Eren shrugged them off his shoulders while Eren tied off the condom and threw it in the small waste bin he spotted next to Levi’s nightstand. He knelt over Levi and pecked him on the cheek, dark skin glistening with sweat.

“Would you grab a washcloth from the bathroom there?” Levi pointed a weak hand to the door behind Eren. “You don’t need a key for that one,” he joked. Assuming his sister and friend knew about the key, he probably got door jokes all the time; and if Eren’s eye roll was any indication, it was even more likely that he was sick of them.

Levi listened to the swish of running water as Eren washed his face. Feeling his forehead, Levi attempted to wipe away the sweat that had gathered there. He felt. Really good? Levi tried to think of the last time he had felt this way, but came up short.

The bed creaked when Eren returned with the washcloth, pleasantly warm. He tenderly and thoroughly cleaned Levi upon his plain-spoken request to avoid falling asleep in a disgusting mess. He hummed a soft song while he did so, the song he had sung at the madrone.

“What is that song about?” Levi asked, voice hoarse, fingers tracing mindless patterns on Eren’s thighs.

“It’s something my mom use to sing. But I think she made up the meaning... When mom adopted me and Mikasa, she tried to learn things about the places we came from, so she found some Turkish song and tried to learn it and sing it to me as a lullaby. I don’t speak Turkish, but she told me it was a song about seeing someone you knew out of the corner of your eye, wanting to hold them close. Turn, turn, turn around,” Eren fell back into the music as he explained, peppering featherlight kisses all over Levi as he did it. “Forget your troubles, remember your blessings, turn, turn around."

They scrabbled to get under the covers, and although it was sort of chilly now that they weren’t exerting themselves, Eren was like a burning furnace, so Levi hugged him tightly to bask in his heat.

“Would you stay for breakfast?” Levi found himself asking, once more thrilled with the timing of quitting his job. His eyes drifted shut, heavy with fatigue. Eren hummed affirmatively, his mouth on Levi’s head, still kissing him here and there.

Levi fell asleep in the most profound warmth he had ever felt.

 

*

 

When Levi awoke, he was instantly aware of how warm it was. Often he woke up freezing, having forgotten to fetch an extra blanket, reluctant to turn up the thermostat for the sake of cost. But today, wrapped in Eren’s arms and the bedsheets, he was almost sweating from the heat.

He looked at Eren in the light of the sunrise, watching his chest rise and fall with deep breaths, observing the way his long eyelashes almost brushed his cheeks. Following the trail of Eren’s necklace, he noticed the key was uncomfortably pressed against his upper arm. Peeling it off with a hiss, he examined the key-shaped imprint on his skin. He wasn’t sure if Eren ever took off the key, seeing as it was important, so he simply repositioned it in lieu of removing it. Levi wondered if somebody else could use Eren’s key. Probably not, he thought. Levi had never seen any strange doors before. If you couldn’t see the door, how could you open it?

He thought about how comfortable he was in Eren’s arms, which felt strong and sure around him. What would it take to convince Eren to stay? Would it take any convincing at all? How long would this blissful feeling last?

Slowly, Eren’s eyes fluttered open. He yawned, turning his head away but pulling Levi closer. Levi ran his hands up and down Eren’s back, gently raking his fingernails, applying a little pressure, hinting that he was down for another round.

Eren apparently was, too, firmly grabbing a hold of Levi’s ass and biting down on the skin between his neck and shoulder. Levi gasped and dug his fingernails into Eren’s back to get even.

“Sorry,” Eren said, not sounding sorry. Facing Levi, he asked, “Can I mark you?”

The bluntness threw Levi for a loop, but he quickly recovered and nodded. “That’s fine,” he said. Eren looked grateful and starting working on the spot where he’d bitten Levi, sucking hard, dragging his tongue over where his mouth encircled the skin. Levi’s vision swirled, but came back to earth remembering he hadn’t showered. “Wait—we have to brush our teeth first.” Eren snorted and pulled away to fix Levi with a look until he realized he was serious. “I have extra toothbrushes in the medicine cabinet,” he added. 

They rolled out of bed, Eren groaning childishly. Levi’s hips ached and he wobbled to the bathroom, standing at the sink; Eren noticed and massaged them while he rifled through the cabinet and put toothpaste on a wet toothbrush for Eren. They brushed their teeth together, and Levi had to avoid Eren’s eyes in the mirror, the mundane gesture too much to handle. 

“Okay,” Levi said, spitting and rinsing his brush after three minutes. Eren, who was probably a one-and-a-half-minute brusher, obviously felt obliged to take the same amount of time at brushing as Levi. 

“Okay,” Eren echoed, putting the toothbrush down. “Just fuck me up!” he sang, jumping back into Levi’s bed.

“Don’t tempt me,” Levi warned, dropping off a damp towel on the nightstand and climbing into bed where he looped his arms around Eren and their minty breath mingled between them. Eren went back to Levi’s neck, this time right where his jaw ended. It tickled, and Levi hissed. Once Eren was satisfied of the progress he’d made on Levi’s neck, he moved down to the plane of Levi’s chest, just under his clavicle, sucking hard and leaving red marks behind where his mouth trailed. He drew his tongue over Levi’s nipple, pulling away and ghosting his breath over it. Levi hummed, pleased with all the attention he was getting. He wanted to return the favor. Gently nudging Eren off of him, he pushed him onto his stomach and kneeled over him, sitting back on his feet and started kneading Eren’s back.

“What do you want for breakfast?” Levi asked, pressing into the dimples of Eren’s back with his thumbs, then rolling Eren up onto his side and trailing his fingers down the cleft of Eren’s ass to press against his hole. Eren seized up, breath hitching.

“Uh,” Eren started.

“Eloquent,” Levi noted, pressing again, snaking a hand around to Eren’s front to grab his erection.

“I just—“ Eren practically squeaked when Levi stroked him. “W-what do you have?” 

“Just a sec—is this okay?” Levi asked. Eren nodded furiously. “Okay.” Levi grabbed the lube from the nightstand and continued.

“I’m a pretty good cook, so,” he began, warming the lube between his fingers. “I can make just about anything.” he ghosted over Eren’s hole again, pressing a finger to it and pushing in slowly then pulling back a little, a slow tempo to match their conversation. 

“Pancakes, waffles, eggs—fried, scrambled, poached, over-easy; you name it. Christ, maybe I should try re-opening the Shari’s,” he mused while pushing another finger into Eren who laughed weakly.

“That would be— _ah_!,” Eren’s breath hitched as Levi scissored his fingers and ran his finger over the slit of his cock. “That would be pretty funny.” Eren’s voice was thin, and it made it sound like he didn’t think it was very funny at all. 

“You’re damn right it’d be funny,” Levi agreed. “It’d be part comedy-club if I ran it.” He pulled his fingers out of Eren and added a little more lube, pushing back in with three, marveling at the tightness. 

“ _Ha_ ,” Eren breathed. “ _Hilarious_.” 

“Can I mark _you_?” Levi asked, voice low. Eren nodded again, his panting indicating he was leaving coherency behind. Levi angled to bite and suck at the nape of Eren’s neck, moving around to where the skin connected to his shoulder, worrying his tongue there. He crooked his fingers to where Eren had responded to before and pushed, getting exactly the reaction he wanted. Eren’s back arched and he cried out, breathing labored. Levi chuckled and continued, his own breathing growing heavy. He was running out of things to say and talking about breakfast wasn’t sexy anymore. Maybe it wasn’t sexy in the first place. Whatever, Levi had a six-pack, and Eren looked at him like anything he said would be a turn-on. 

“You’re really cute, I hope you know that,” he praised. Eren didn’t respond other than with the whimpering from the stimulation Levi was providing. “I’m sure you do—overconfident brat. But wow,” he said, stroking Eren faster. “When I saw you in the Preserve yesterday, I thought you were handsome, but when I saw you on stage at the restaurant, I thought, ‘fuck, he’s gorgeous,” Levi wasn’t finished, but Eren came suddenly with a sob, head falling against the pillow.

“And you like being praised,” Levi added, wiping his hand on the towel on the nightstand, then bringing his hand to his own erection. “Tell me,” he grunted. “Doesn’t anyone tell you how talented you are? How attractive?” Eren looked at Levi with glassy eyes, face wrecked with pleasure. His eyebrows were tight in an incredulous look. “You’re beautiful,” he said, cradling Eren’s face with his free hand.

“Levi, come for me,” Eren said, voice gravelly. Levi obliged. He collapsed next to Eren in bliss, and they held each other’s gaze.

“Waffles,” Eren decided. 

“Shower,” Levi added. “And then waffles.”

 

*

 

They bathed together, washing each other’s hair and bodies, kissing lazily under the warm spray of water. They dried off together, toweling each other behind the ears. And then they got dressed together, Eren wearing one of Levi’s sweatshirts over his briefs. They almost made the bed together until Levi insisted he was the only one who could do it properly.

“I forgot to tell you your apartment is really nice,” he said while Levi searched the pantry for flour. “Anyway I can help?”

“Waffle iron is under the cabinet there and syrup is above the sink,” Levi pointed. “And thank you.” 

“I always wanted a cool place to myself, you know?” Eren said, plugging in the iron and adjusting the heat setting. “But Mikasa and Armin and I have always lived together in different places. We move around a lot.” He rifled through the cabinet above the sink and cheered, “Nutella!”

“Why is that?” Levi asked, measuring out the ingredients into a mixing bowl.

“I think it’s because of me. If we move around a lot, I don’t feel like I have to walk through doors all the time. When I was younger, it used to sort of be this thing where I would just have to wander. No one ever knew where I was. Especially after my mom died. I just. Needed to get away,” he said, looking distant. “But now I feel like I could stay in one spot, you know?” He admitted, looking far too fondly at Levi, whose heart felt the way a firework looks.

“Yeah,” he said, delighted with the idea. “Sit down, I’ve got it from here,” he told Eren. “They seem nice,” Levi said, moving a finished waffle to a plate. “Your sister and friend.”

“Yeah!! They are amazing, really. I’m so grateful. I don’t think I deserve how cool they are, haha. You should meet them!” He said, delighted.

“I just have one more question,” Levi said, handing Eren a plate with two waffles on it. “How did you know my passcode when you put your number in my phone?”

“Ah, that one is a secret,” Eren chided, around a mouthful of Nutella-drenched waffle. Levi pursed his lips. He supposed he could let that one go. But after Eren and Hanji having cracked his code, he made a mental note to change it.

“I’m just gonna text Mikasa, if you don’t mind,” he said, tapping at his phone.

“Not at all,” Levi said, scrolling the _Sina Times_ app. It was the usual news—articles about celebrities, advice columns, world news. Except.

_Except_. 

“What the fuck?” Levi muttered, re-reading the article his eyes had fallen onto. 

“What is it?” Eren asked, still staring at his phone. 

“I’m not sure I know,” Levi said skeptically. “Did you hear about that explosion after the earthquake in Rose the other day?”

“Yeah! Did you see the video!?” Eren asked. Levi nodded slowly.

“I think you should see this,” he said, holding up his phone so Eren could read the headline and see the picture.

_ **Unusual Debris Found in Rose Explosion Investigation** _

Just below the headline and credits, there was a picture of what was reportedly the epicenter of the explosion—a crater that was 15 meters in diameter and in the middle of it, standing on a splintered wooden two by four, was a completely unscathed, solitary, knob-intact door. 

“Holy shit,” Eren breathed, grabbing Levi’s phone with one hand, as though steadying the image to verify its existence. He went back to his phone, googling “rose explosion,” only to have the same picture pop up. “'Investigators are puzzled by the undamaged status of the door,'” Eren read. “‘It does not open from either side and local police are still inquiring into the floor plans of the building it might be leftover from.’” Eren’s hand dropped. “Levi—“

“You don’t have anything to do with this, do you?” He asked, anxious to know the answer.  Eren shook his head.

“No, not at all,” Eren said in disbelief. “But this could be someone like me, Levi. Someone who can walk through the doors.”

Levi wasn’t sure how to respond—this was clearly a game changer for Eren, but he wasn’t sure if it was such a good thing. “I don’t know, Eren,” he said. “You saw the video—the explosion was terrifying. Even if this is someone like you, how can you be sure they’re someone to be trusted? What if they caused the explosion?” Eren was listening to Levi, but he looked distant.

“I have to know,” he said. Levi felt somewhere between resigned and heartbroken. It must have shown on his face, because Eren touched his cheek softly. He stared into his eyes, eyebrows drawn together in worry.

“I had so much fun with you,” he began. “I think you’re amazing. If you’re in, I want to keep doing this. Maybe go on an actual date or something,” he laughed. Levi marveled at the sound of it.

“Yeah,” he breathed. “Me too.” They kissed, still sitting on their respective stools. Levi pulled away slowly. “Can't I go with you?”

“The hallways are dangerous,” Eren explained. “I can’t take people in them if I don’t know exactly where I’m going. I almost lost someone because of it,” he looked far away again. "I can’t say I’ll be back soon, but I will be back,” he sounded determined. Again, Levi believed him.

Eren stood up and walked to Levi’s room, where he fetched his things. Levi’s hands clenched and unclenched, his heart beating fast. Where was Eren going? Was it going to be dangerous? When would he see him again?

“Eren?” he said, walking to his room. Eren appeared in the doorway, chest to chest with Levi. He smiled brightly down at him.

“I really, really like you, Levi. You’re a good cook, too! Sorry I can’t help with the dishes. And I can’t wait to play for you sometime, your own personal show. I’ll let you know when I’ve come up with a setlist,” he said, something so final in his manner. He and Levi shared one more deep kiss, searing and intense and prolonged like it was the end of the world.

“Close your eyes,” Eren said.

“Eren,” Levi whispered, his eyes falling shut almost against his will. The next words fell out of his mouth without his permission: “I trust you."

Silently, somehow, Eren had slipped away through a door and was gone.

 

*

 

Eren had left his phone on the counter.

His phone! How was Levi going to contact him now? How would he be able to check on him and whatever he was planning to do in Rose City? Eren had said those warm things to him, had held him in his arms...

They had only just met. Was this over? They barely knew each other. What was Eren’s middle name, or his favorite color? Why did Levi feel like he needed this continue so badly?

He had a sudden idea, thinking of the only people who would know how to trace Eren at all.

Eren didn’t have a passcode on his phone and Armin Arlert was the first name in his contact list. Levi repeatedly hit the call button faster than the screen would allow. Bouncing on his heels as the dial tone droned, he tried to shake out the itchy anxiety welling up in his fingers. He needed another shower. 

It hadn’t been more than two rings when he heard a stressed-sounding, “Hello?” A faint voice could be heard beyond the receiver, possibly Mikasa asking, “Is that Eren!?"

“Hi, is this Armin?” Levi asked, making sure the name matched the recipient of the call. The other end of the line was silent for a few seconds.

“Yes this is Armin. Is there a reason you’re using my friend's phone?” He asked carefully. Levi didn’t think he’d get this far in the call, so he hadn’t planned on how to best phrase his current circumstances. He cursed the universe for not having vouchsafed him with social graces.

“Eren came home with me last night,” he began, beating himself up for starting with that. “Uh okay, wait—He’s a really cool guy and he took me through a door but now he's left his phone here—“

“He took you through the hallways?!” Armin yelled.

“Before you get upset—have you seen the news about the Rose City earthquake and explosion yet today?” Levi asked, anxiety boiling in his throat, unsure of how to break this news to Eren’s friend and sister.

“Not yet, let me check,” Armin said, taking a deep breath and steadying his voice. The manner reminded Levi of Erwin’s demeanor. He chewed on his cheek waiting for Armin to reach the same page as him and see the door.

“Oh my god,” Levi heard Armin say. Mikasa could be heard behind him.

“What is it, did he get arrested? Is he—what the _fuck_ is _that_?” Levi figured he and Mikasa were of the same type, and he identified with her instantly.

“Levi,” Armin said slowly. “Where is Eren?”

“I don’t know,” Levi said, pissed at himself for not having been able to stop Eren, stop his friends from feeling the same way he did. “One minute we were eating waffles and the next he was telling me goodbye. I’m actually sort of pissed off at him,” He explained, muttering the last bit. “Do you think he's in danger?” Armin was quiet again, likely considering all of the options, which he was sure he knew better than Levi, who was deeply grateful Armin had answered in the first place.

“He might be. They still don’t know what caused the explosion, right? In that case, however that door—that apparently no one can open—got there, right in the middle of it all, someone who can use them must be inextricably involved,” Armin said with firm conviction that somehow lessened Levi’s anxiety. “And if this person is as powerful or dangerous as whatever the Rose City Herald or Murphy’s Law boasts, Eren could be in trouble."

“We need to get to Rose as soon as possible,” Mikasa told Levi, having taken the phone from Armin, who was audibly upset about it.

“How are you planning on getting there?” Levi asked, knowing vaguely enough about their position that they didn’t have spare cash for a couple of flights to the other side of the country, and Mikasa was pointedly silent at Levi’s inquiry. Perhaps it was wrong to use money as leverage, but as Levi wracked his brain, he kept coming back to only one option.

“Listen,” he began. “It’s a two-day drive over. But I have a friend who could probably lend the money to fly over there. And here’s the deal: I’ll ask him for it if you let me come with you.” It was a tad farfetched considering Levi had yet to formally meet either Mikasa or Armin under normal circumstances. Furthermore, Erwin didn’t know anything about what was going on other than the fact that he and Eren left the restaurant together. 

After waiting for what felt like forever, the other two reached an ultimatum. “That’s fine,” Armin said. “We need to leave as soon as possible anyway. What do you need us to do?”

Levi sighed in relief. “Alright, so pack a carry-on and come pick me up at my address. I’ll text it to you from Eren’s phone. While you’re on your way, I’ll get a hold of my friend and book something for this afternoon.” He checked the clock—it wasn’t yet ten o’clock. He knew there were direct flights to Rose every three hours starting at eight in the morning. And it was Tuesday? How busy could the airport be? There was a chance they might be able to catch the one o’clock flight out.

“Deal,” Armin replied.

“Okay,” Levi said. They hung up and Levi typed out a rapid-fire message detailing his address. With equal swiftness, Armin responded,  **That’s not far from us at all. We’ll be there in a half hour.**  


Levi tore through his room, assembling a suitcase and packing various things he figured he might need for exploring whatever underground mess Eren could get himself into, like a flashlight, extra socks, a first aid kit, and every single protein bar he had in his pantry. He dialed Erwin while washing the dishes, and when he didn’t answer, he called Hanji.

“Well if it isn’t Mr. Sexy! How was piano boy~” Hanji answered. 

“Hanji, do you know where Erwin is?” Levi responded, grunting as he scrubbed at the Nutella stuck to the plate and reminding him of how mad he was at Eren. 

“Oh, that bad? You need to talk to somebody about it, huh? Well I’m sorry to hear that. Erwin is in fact busy driving over here! You could talk to me about it, too, you know!” 

“Thank you, Hanji, I’m grateful,” Levi deadpanned, drying off a plate. “Why is Erwin going to the hospital?” 

“He’s coming to visit the intern who got in the bike accident. She woke up!” They sounded pleased. “He’ll also probably stop by to see me, too. Come hang out with us!”

Levi figured this could be a good thing. He didn’t know how to ask Erwin for the money without telling him the truth, and only someone like Hanji could rationalize this weird-ass situation. They were his best wingman. 

“Hanji, I’ll be there in a half an hour. I need to talk to you and Erwin about something important and really quickly. It’s really important to me.” He recognized Hanji probably knew him better than he knew himself. Sure enough, they must have picked up on the desperate tone in his voice. 

“Of course, Levi,” Hanji said. “The girl’s name is Christa; she’s in room 245. Meet us there, alright?” 

They hung up and Levi gave his apartment a once-over. He began to turn off the lights, making sure everything was in order and in its place, that he had rallied everything he needed for however long they would need to spend in Rose City looking for Eren. He hoped it wouldn’t be too long, but he’d prolong his stay if he had to. Anything to get Eren back here, where he wore a look of admiration when observing the apartment and Levi.

A honk from outside tore him from his trance, and he collected his suitcase and looked around one last time before locking the door behind him.  

 

*

 

“Hello,” Levi said getting into the car, where he was under intense and immediate scrutiny from Armin and Mikasa. “Uh. Nice to meet you. Well, not under these circumstances, but you both seem like nice people. Is what I mean,” Levi coughed to fill the silence. They both turned back to face in front of them.

“I told you he doesn’t seem like a murderer,” Armin reasoned to Mikasa in a hushed voice. Mikasa who was driving, pursed her lips and shot him a look. Was he supposed to defend his status as a non-murderer?

“Yeah he’s not smooth enough at all,” Mikasa said, not trying to be quiet. "Where to, captain?” She asked, dryly. Ah, looked like he was safe from playing Law and Order for the moment. “The airport?” 

“Not yet,” Levi said. “Money first. Do you know the way to Sina Hospital?” For some reason, this was funny, and Armin threw his head back in laughter. 

“We were just there last night,” he explained. Mikasa held up a bandaged right hand. “Mikasa cut herself pretty deep while peeling potatoes.”

“How,” Levi began, not sure he wanted to know. “And why were you peeling potatoes at probably eleven at night?” 

“You don’t do weird shit to blow off steam? Get off my ass,” Mikasa snorted. Armin turned back to face Levi, still smiling. He hid his mouth with the back of his hand and mouthed _Eren_. Levi nodded, raising an eyebrow. Yeah, he and Mikasa probably had even more in common than he originally thought. 

They made little conversation on the way to the hospital. When they parked, Levi hurried them inside and to the nearest elevator. An adamant hater of hospitals, Levi was pleased to have somebody with him to push the buttons and touch the door handles so he wouldn’t have to. 

They arrived to room 245 where Hanji and Erwin said they’d be. Sure enough, they were standing near the bed where a petit blonde girl lay, tangled in narrow plastic tubes and covered in painful-looking, dark bruising. This must be Christa. To her left was a girl with dark skin and freckles sitting in a chair. The girl with freckles shot Mikasa and Armin a friendly look.

“How funny,” Armin said. "She was in the waiting room when we got here last night,” He breathed a laugh in disbelief. “Small world."

Erwin and Hanji greeted Levi and his group. 

“Hi,” Levi began. “Sorry to hear about your accident, glad you’re awake,” he said to the patient. “Sorry to bother you with all of these strangers,” he told the girl in the chair. “And sorry in advance to both of you,” he pointed to Erwin and Hanji. “Come over here.”

“Have you ever heard him apologize more in his life?” Hanji asked Erwin sounding somewhere between astonished and proud, as they walked over to the door where Levi stood beside Mikasa and Armin.

“Only the day after Petra and Oluo’s wedding after he admitted to drunkenly stealing the china plate set that Oluo’s dying grandmother gifted them—“

“Really bad time for that, Erwin,” Levi said, carding a hand through his hair. “I need a favor.”

Erwin’s expression grew grave at Levi’s somber tone, though Hanji seemed prepared for what Levi had to say.

“What do you need?” Erwin asked, appearing as though he would give Levi the Grand Canyon if he could.

“I need you to believe me,” Levi said. “Okay, so after Eren and I left the restaurant, we had a really nice evening right? He’s something else. Anyway, it turns out he’s some sort of dimensional space/time traveler and that explosion in Rose has something to do with other people who have the same capacity.” Levi held up his phone displaying the article with the picture of the door. “Eren was curious and left and now we don’t know where he is and he could be in danger. These are his sister and friend,” he gestured to the two at his side.

“They were at the restaurant last night,” Hanji remarked. Levi nodded. They extended their hand to Mikasa and Armin, and they introduced themselves.

“How can I help you find him?” Erwin asked after reading the article on Levi’s phone. 

“I just need to borrow some money for flights over there. I have enough for accommodations and whatever, but I don’t want to dig into my savings for this. I’m really sorry, Erwin, but I’m also really desperate,” Levi huffed. Erwin pulled out his wallet and dug around, a smile spreading across his face.

“Damn, just how good was the sex, Levi?” Erwin joked, trying to lighten the mood.

“Some of the best in my life,” Levi didn’t hesitate. “But I don’t think that’s what this is about.” Erwin handed him a Visa card with some sort of airline logo on it. “I think it’s something more.”

“It must be,” Erwin agreed. “Use what you need, and don’t worry. I know you’ll get me back." Levi was overwhelmed and actually pulled Erwin into a short but firm hug in gratitude. "I guess this means you’ll be missing Thanksgiving dinner, though?” Erwin asked. Levi frowned and nodded, disappointed. Hanji’s expression was tragic. They didn’t really have families except for each other, and they always spent the night eating amazing food and getting drunk and watching _Mrs. Doubtfire_.

As he drew away from Erwin, Levi noticed the girl in the chair fumbling with something around her neck.

“Sorry again,” he told her. Her expression didn’t change until the girl lying in the bed spoke up.

“Ymir flew half-way around the world when she heard what happened,” she said weakly. 

“Girlfriend of the Year,” Hanji added.

Halfway around the world? Hadn’t the girl gotten in the accident yesterday morning? Didn’t Armin just say they’d seen her in the waiting room last night? How long would it take to find out about that and get around the world in time to be here the same day? It was jumping to conclusions to say the least, but when Ymir pawed at her neck again, Levi was talking before he knew it.

“You!” He said, in a tone preferably avoided in hospitals. “Are you a Door Person?” Armin rushed to Levi’s side and pushed down the hand pointing at the girl and hushed him.

“Levi, you can’t just ask people that, you can’t—“ 

The girl in the chair leaned back in her seat and pulled her necklace out from her shirt, to reveal where a silver Berlin key hung from the chain. Her smile didn’t reach her eyes, but she did look like she wanted to congratulate Levi for guessing.

If Erwin and Hanji had any previous doubts about Levi’s claim, they were silenced by the hypnotizing swing of the key on the chain.

“Guess I should be a little more subtle,” Ymir mused. “I rushed over here so quickly when I heard the news that I forgot to come up with a decent cover story. You’re too honest, babe,” Ymir said, pawing at Christa’s bruised cheek.

“I’m so glad you’ve got that thing. I wanted you to be the first thing I saw when I woke up,” Christa mumbled.

“Did you have anything to do with the mess in Rose City?” Mikasa asked, completely ruining their moment. Ymir shook her head.

“I don’t, sorry. Why do you need to know?”

“My suicidal bastard of a brother is missing and playing detective,” Mikasa groaned, rubbing her eyes with the palms of her hands.

“I can’t believe there’s another one of you,” Armin said, breaking his silence after trying to process the events. “Eren would love to meet you,” he added.

“Eren? Okay, this might be a little presumptuous, but after you said ‘suicidal bastard,’ I was positive—do you know a guy named Jean?” Ymir asked.

“Jean Kirstein?” Armin asked, incredulous. “Yes.”

“Okay. He and Christa and I went to college together. He talked about Eren a lot,” she said. “Man, and I thought the world was small before this thing,” she laughed, indicating the key.

“Where’s Jean now?” Mikasa asked.

“Rose City,” Ymir replied.

“It could be possible that Eren might see him,” Armin interjected. Levi was lost, but looking at Armin and Mikasa, he felt as though they had had to search for Eren like this before. “Do you have his phone number by any chance, Ymir? We fell out of touch with Jean years ago.” While the three of them spoke, Erwin and Hanji looked to Levi.

“Are you sure you know what you’re getting into?” Hanji asked.

“Not one bit,” Levi said. The only thing Levi _was_ utterly confident about was that he had no idea what he was doing.

“It’s gonna work out,” Erwin said, clapping Levi on the shoulder. “You’re going to find him.” Levi thanked them both again and looked at Armin and Mikasa who were finishing up their conversation with Ymir and Christa. 

“Sorry this has to be so short,” Armin said. “Maybe we can all be friends after this.” The statement hung in the air, as Levi made his goodbyes to his friends, walking out the door. 

“I’ll keep you guys updated,” he said. Erwin and Hanji wished him luck. 

With a final wave to everyone in the room, Levi, Mikasa, and Armin filed into the hallway and out of the hospital, into the car, and on their way to the airport. 

 

*

 

The car ride to the airport was completely silent the whole way except for one cathartic comment from Levi, to which no reply was made. 

“This is fucking crazy!”

 

*

 

“It looks like I do have three open seats on the one o’clock flight to Rose City, but we’ll have to split you between two rows. Is that alright?” Asked the agent at the ticket counter. Armin said yes before anyone could protest. “I unfortunately cannot check any of your baggage at this point, however—you’ll have to carry it on."

“That’s not a problem,” Levi said at the same time Mikasa said, “That’s fine.” The airline agent thought it was adorable.

“Are you two related?” she asked with a giggle. Neither responded with more than a glare.

While Armin tried to rescue the situation with his many social graces, Levi and Mikasa took their boarding passes and began heading for security.

It was a swift jaunt through security and to their gate where they had already begun to board. 

Levi looked at the crowd lined up and giving their passes to the gate agent and he sifted through his bag for his hand sanitizer.

“If we got an aisle seat I call dibs on it,” he said, finding his sanitizer and dropping a glob onto his hands.

“We have two,” Armin said, shuffling forward in the line very slowly, explaining the letters on their passes. “So we can chat over the aisle.”

When they had sat down and the plane was taking off, Levi noticed Armin with his eyes closed across the aisle, holding Mikasa’s hand.

“You okay, kid?” Levi asked.

“Planes are most likely to experience some sort of malfunction during take off and landing,” Armin explained, eyes still closed. “Flying make me nervous. I’ll be okay once we’re in the air.”

“Face your death with eyes open,” Mikasa declared, like some sort of righteous feudal lord. Regardless of the statement, she still held Armin’s hand with a white knuckled grasp.

When the plane had steadied its incline, Levi’s ears felt full of pressure. He tried to yawn when Mikasa threw something heavy wrapped in plastic at him, interrupting and ruining his yawn. He sighed, and it must’ve sounded fairly sinister to have Mikasa glaring at him like that.

“You seem like the hangry type. Eat that,” she said, gesturing to the Clif Bar in Levi’s hands that she had thrown. With a frown, he opened the protein bar and ate it in four huge bites.

“Look at you!” said the woman in the middle seat next to him. “So hungry! Jim, remember when Steven would eat like that?” She nudged Jim and Levi in the sides. “You’re a growing boy!” she cheered, gently patting Levi on the head.

“I’m thirty years old, ma’am,” he replied through gritted teeth at the stranger’s touch. The woman shrunk back in a moment of recognition and indiscreetly wiped her hand on her jeans. She reached for the SkyMall magazine in the seat pocket to avoid further conversation with Levi.

“You’re meddling, Barbara,” Jim grunted, pulling his 49ers cap over his forehead, rolling toward the window.

Regardless of Barbara, Levi felt a lot better after eating.

“You’re thirty?” Mikasa asked in disbelief, counting the difference between him and Eren on her fingers.

“Almost,” Levi said, feeling like it wouldn't make a difference to Mikasa that he still had a month before his birthday.

“Does that get old pretty quickly?” Armin interjected, leaning into the aisle. “People assuming things because you’re… uhm…"

“Short?” Levi asked. Barbara shifted uncomfortably. “And yes. But they mostly just assume that it’s something I care about.” Armin smiled as if he knew exactly what Levi was describing. Looking past his handsome features, Levi could imagine when they were awkward once, with his light eyelashes, his pale skin, his odd haircut; these were things that were probably used against him.

“They just want to get a reaction out of you,” he said, and Levi mimicked Armin’s half smile as though it were his white flag. Mikasa watched something from his demeanor fall away and she leaned over, resting her forearms on Armin’s lap to join the conversation.

“Tell me,” Levi said, leaning over a little more so as not to be heard by his seat neighbors. “How did you two get to this exact moment?”

Armin and Mikasa exchanged a look. They were totally silent, communicating something important.

“I met Mikasa and Eren in elementary school,” Armin began, after breaking away from Mikasa’s gaze.

“We were third graders then. All about 8 years old. We were both in the same class, and my grandpa actually lived in the same neighborhood as Eren’s family. So we’d be together all day at school, all day at home, and always together during summer vacation. 

“It’s no surprise that we became really close. We were all so different, but similar enough to be friends. Even though none of us were related by blood, we felt like siblings. So one day, Eren and Mikasa trusted me enough to tell me about Eren’s Skeleton Key. I was a pretty rational kid, but something about these two knuckleheads was so honest. I believed them as soon as Eren disappeared from the kitchen where he was demonstrating and reappeared on the stairs behind me,” Armin couldn’t suppress a giggle at recalling the memory.

“They both had been through the hallways before, and I started going along with them. We would just explore, avoiding walking through doors that led to far away and risky places. We always had to hold Eren’s hand. However, we did it less and less as we got older, mostly because it was affecting Eren negatively,” Armin described. “Especially after the incident.”

“The incident?” Levi prompted. Mikasa picked up where Armin left off.

“After our mom died, Eren was in the hallways all the time. Just disappearing, without a word. He’d leave in the middle of class, or while we were just hanging out sometimes. Most of the time we had no idea where he was,” she explained, looking distant. Mikasa was quiet for a little bit, and Armin touched her shoulder softly, silently telling her something. She continued, 

“Then he met this guy and they started dating. They were horrible for each other, pig-headed and headstrong in the worst ways possible. But Jean was good for Eren, somehow. He kept him grounded to where we were. Eren hadn’t wandered the hallways for some time. 

“But Eren is a really honest person, and he felt like he was deceiving Jean by omitting his ability. So he surprised Jean one day and took him through the hallways. Jean flipped the fuck out and let go of Eren’s hand. Eren said he’d fallen through a few doors. He was desperately looking for almost an hour before he found him,” Mikasa paused, chewing her lip and searching her mind on how to continue the story. 

“Needless to say, Jean and Eren broke up. And then Jean moved away to prove a point of being an asshole and Eren was depressed again. But instead of wandering, this time he tried to stay. He tried some meds and he threw himself into learning the piano that was at our Uncle Hannes' house. And then Hannes set him up at a friend’s bar to play a show. 

“Eren started playing tons of shows, and we’d tag along, too. Eventually, it was time to move away to college. It was great—we were moving around so constantly that Eren didn’t have time to wander. But now, because of whatever the hell is going on in Rose City, Eren’s back in the hallways. They make him crazy, Levi. He’s so excited about life when he’s not looking for a new one in those hallways,” Mikasa’s tone was firm, wavering only a little when she said ‘crazy’.

“And then he played at the Bella Notte Trattoria last night, went home with you, Mikasa cut her hand on the potato peeler, we went to sleep after a trip to the hospital, then you gave us a call and here we are. On an airplane,” Armin wrapped up, asking the flight attendant who had just pulled up with their cart for a ginger ale. They poured him a cup promptly.

“And right now, in this moment, we are flying into god-knows-what in Rose City, worried if we’ll even find Eren,” Armin said, looking a little manic when he raised it toward Levi. “Cheers,” he tried.

“We’re going to find him,” Mikasa said with conviction so strong Levi felt it rattle his common sense.

“To hoping god-knows-what isn’t too much for the three of us to handle,” Levi said, raising his cup. “And finding Eren.” He bumped his plastic cup of water to Armin and Mikasa’s plastic cups for a very anticlimactic toast and readjusted in his seat to mull over everything Armin and Mikasa had just told him.

 

*

 

The rest of the flight felt easy compared to the drive to the airport. Levi, Armin, and Mikasa talked about lighter things like their first jobs, favorite foods, and majors in college. Levi explained how he majored in accounting but fell out of love with it. Mikasa majored in computer programming and Armin had a dual degree in art history and classical literature, both able to work from home (wherever they made it) on their start-up website. Before they knew it, the captain was announcing their descent.

“Alright, here’s the plan,” Armin started, standing from his seat and unloading his suitcase from the cabin above him. “I contacted Jean before we got on the plane. He said he hasn’t seen Eren, but he gave me his address and told us to stop by today.” Mikasa gave Armin an incredulous look. “We can book a hotel when we get there."

“I know, Mikasa. But it’s almost been six years since it happened. He’s probably changed,” Armin said, shuffling down the aisle.

They wheeled out of the gate and toward baggage claim.

“Taxi or subway?” Mikasa asked after stopping in the middle of the junction. The colossal airport was surprisingly barren of people.

“Subway’s cheaper right? Probably just as fast as a taxi in Rose City traffic,” Armin reasoned. One hand on his suitcase, the other rifling for his hand sanitizer, Levi made the executive decision by walking toward the subway.

Once aboard, Armin and Mikasa allowed themselves a moment of relaxation; they’d finally arrived to where Eren was most likely to be. Levi stood his guard, keeping a hand on his luggage. He scanned the subway, reading the passengers and searching for evidence of the earthquake, explosion, and any lingering stress on their faces. It wasn’t the biggest earthquake Rose had ever seen, but it was big enough that a few people died in the subsequent explosion.

The passengers looked normal. Completely average in the way some looked dead inside, others wearing friendly resting faces, a few couples who looked desperately in love, a few others who appeared at the end of their ropes with public transportation. Levi examined the single passengers: an old person with a polished wooden cane; a girl with a hooked nose and her hands in the pockets of her blue hoodie; a person with a fedora and facial hair in need of trimming; and a woman in a coral pantsuit and Andy Warhol glasses with a Pomeranian on her lap. It was a crew so motley that Levi could imagine their personalities if they were characters in a book—and how none of them would get along.

“Jean says to get off at Drill Street Station,” Armin mumbled without taking his eyes off his phone. 

Drill Street Station was the next stop. The older passenger with the cane and the girl with the hoodie made to get off as the train slowed to a halt. When the doors open, Levi let them off first. The older one gave him a crinkled smile and the girl was doing that awkward _are-you-going-first-or-am-I_ shuffle that folks who aren’t used to public transit do.

“Just _go_ ,” Levi urged as the doors beeped, warning to close. The girl raced out and Armin, Levi and Mikasa hopped onto the station and took the escalator up to the surface.

Armin lead the way, barking directions and staring at his phone while Mikasa played auto pilot for him, guiding him around pot holes and stopping him at intersections. Levi wasn’t sure if they were dating or just almost siblings/friends but he thought they’d make a good couple. 

Rose City looked dusty. The sun was setting on an overcast day, and the gray-yellow color of the clouds seemed to have settled over the sidewalks and brick walls and towers of downtown. 

“Alright,” Armin said. “Siri says our destination is on our left.”

They were stopped before a door that led to apartments above a gourmet chocolate shop. There were a list of names next to doorbells, and Mikasa unenthusiastically pressed the one next to _Kirstein_ and they waited.

The buzzer croaked and the door unlocked, allowing them passage to the third floor.

 

*

 

“Hello! Hello!” The man at the door was smiling, a warm natural blush covering his face full of freckles. Levi knew instantly that this was not Jean. “Come in! My name is Marco.” He extended his hand to shake with the three of them, simultaneously taking their coats. The apartment smelled like spaghetti. "Jean ran to the bank—he’ll be back in a jiffy.”

From the stories, Levi was having a hard time imagining just how the Jean he’d been hearing about ended up being friends with a man who said hello twice and unironically used the word “jiffy.”

“I’ve just put the kettle on. Coffee? Tea? I’m so excited to meet you!” Marco seemed unable to contain his puppy-like excitement. “Jean rarely has friends from high school come over. It’s a part of his life I hardly know anything about!” He explained. “I should mention that I’m his husband, by the way,” he added, flashing the back of his hand much like Erwin had the day before. Levi’s stomach twisted with a feeling he couldn’t name.

“Nice to meet you,” Mikasa said, actually smiling. She was clearly loving this turn of events. Armin let his eyes travel around the apartment. Levi asked for tea.

They were at the counter talking when Jean came back.

“Honey, I’m back. Guess who I saw at the bank—oh you guys are here already,” Jean said, going from an affectionate tone with Marco to one that sounded faintly disappointed when he noticed the bags in the living room. Jean stepped into the kitchen. He had a long face, with sharp cheekbones, two-tone hair, and brown eyes on either side of his roman nose. An amalgam of features, Levi could see how they made him handsome. Flexing his empty hands, he at last reached out to all three of his guests.

“It’s good to see you,” he told Armin and Mikasa. “Hi, I’m Jean,” he told Levi.

“Levi.”

“Nice to meet you.” 

“…” Levi didn’t mean to not respond, but he genuinely couldn’t come up with anything on the grounds of being exhausted. He hoped it showed on his face. 

“Jean, it’s been ages,” Armin said. “How have you been? Obviously pretty well seeing as you landed this gem,” he said, gesturing to their skilled host. Marco genuinely blushed.

“I’ve been good. Wow, it’s so weird to have you two here. Uhm, before anything. I’m sorry. For leaving when Eren needed someone to trust him the most,” he choked. “I’ve always regretted that. Feels good to get it off my chest,” he said, scratching the back of  his neck, allowing himself a half-smile. Everyone was silent. Marco gave Levi a concerned eyebrow raise as if to say, “man, are we out of the loop, or what?” Levi concurred with a grunt.

“Jean,” Mikasa said, clapping him on the shoulder. Jean looked incredibly hopeful (as he had a crush on Mikasa longer than Eren, Armin had told Levi). “I’ve always thought you were an idiot.”

Jean slumped but looked unsurprised.

“Thanks, Mikasa.”

“You didn’t let me finish. You’ve changed quite a bit.” Her eyes flicked in Marco’s direction. "It’s. _Nice_.” The word “nice” took Mikasa some great effort, but she managed terrifically. “We need your help.”

With a skeptical look, Jean poured himself a cup of coffee and walked over to Marco.

“I haven’t seen Eren,” he said, kissing the top of Marco’s head. “You know I’d tell you if I did. But my leg has been acting up, so the bastard must be in town.

“We know, Jean,” Armin said. “Wait, did something happen to your leg in the hallways?”

“Nah, I just have a bum leg. Eren Jaeger is the scapegoat to all my pain and misfortune.” Jean’s statement amused no one except himself. _Marco looks like he deals with this shit all the time,_ Levi thought. Armin continued.

“What happened the other day, Jean? During the earthquake and explosion?”

A mischievous smile broke across Marco’s face and the fondness that had been on Jean’s face disappeared.

“Jean’s had quite the weekend,” Marco giggled. Jean snorted and lightly pushed on Marco. Trying to sound dignified, he explained:

“My office got demolished in the explosion, so I’m off from work for a week. And I was at an acupuncture appointment during the earthquake.”

Mikasa burst out laughing, the most uninhibited emotion Levi had seen her express in his whole half-a-day of knowing her. In an attempt to be diplomatic, Armin tried not to laugh. Levi found himself chuckling, not at Jean’s expense but rather the absurdity of the situation.

“That must of been the worst feeling in the world,” Levi imagined. “Stressed as fuck, full of needles on a wobbling table.”

“Thanks, glad my neurosis is hilarious,” Jean said bitterly. Marco held his hand.

“I’m sorry, Jean,” Mikasa said, coming down from her giggle fit. “That is truly terrible.” Any sympathy was ruined by the wide smile across her face.

“Anyway,” Jean continued. “Like I said, I’m off from work this week until corporate finds us a new or temporary office. I figured you might need a navigator—I can show you around town. Hopefully we’ll be able to find Eren quickly.” Jean said all of this in an appeal to the old friends he had—that he had regrets and wanted to apologize to Eren as much as they wanted to find him.

“You guys should stay here, too,” Marco offered. “For a night or two. The couch pulls out and we have an air mattress!” 

“Yeah, it’s no problem.” Jean said. “We’re not going out of town for Thanksgiving or anything." After a beat, he turned his focus to Levi. “I’m sorry, I know you told me your name is Levi, but—ah, who are you?” 

Levi schooled his expression as he considered the question. “I’m looking for Eren, too.” Yeah. That sounded good enough. Eyebrows furrowed, Jean nodded slowly. Amin and Mikasa said nothing, just nodding when Jean looked to them for clarification.

“We can go out and look for him tomorrow,” Jean said, glancing at the clock. “Are you guys hungry in the meanwhile? Marco makes his spaghetti from scratch.” 

Dinner was less awkward than introductions, but Levi was too tired and had met too many new people today. His social skills were fading by the minute as his eyelids grew heavy. Rose was two time zones away from Sina, and the although Levi wasn’t too worried about jet lag, he desperately needed to either work out or lay down. 

Finally, they were setting up for the night. Mikasa and Armin were taking the couch and Levi the air mattress, pulling sheets over the corners as it finished blowing up. He tested it a few times, laying down and inflating or deflating it. Armin watched the spectacle with a pleased look. 

As they said their goodnights and turned off the lights, Levi felt himself drifting off, but before he fell asleep, he heard the susurrus of Armin and Mikasa’s voices.

“I like him,” said Armin, his whisper register slightly lower than Mikasa’s.

“He’s not bad,” Mikasa responded. “Jean is way better than I imagined, too.” 

“We might pull this off, Mikasa. And not alone this time.”

Unable to stay awake, Levi didn’t hear the rest. 

 

*

 

Levi didn’t usually dream, but that night he did. 

In his dream, he was playing a card game with someone whose face he couldn’t see, but he was sure it was Hanji because of their contagious laugh.

Suddenly, the scenery changed; he was sitting at the desk in his old office, typing away at an article detailing the events of the Rose City earthquake. Next to him was a bowl of peaches, which dream-Levi knew had to be there so he could type. Behind him he could hear the creaking of a cello and the soft bump of a sustain pedal; the music was a tune he recognized. His tie felt tight around his neck, and just as he resolved to take it off, someone was turning his chair, climbing onto his lap, and removing it for him. It was Eren.

“Man, you look good in a suit. Red is a nice color on you,” Eren said, fingering the silky tie and then throwing it on the ground despite his remark. Levi held Eren’s hips.

“You look good on top of me,” he returned the compliment, letting his hands roam up and down Eren’s body. Eren hummed in delight, squirming around on Levi’s lap not unpleasantly. Levi wanted to ask Eren where he was but dreams didn’t always let you do what you wanted. 

Instead, he and Eren kissed deeply, all open mouths and hot breath. Eren tasted sweet like french toast. He was wearing all black. Levi didn’t know if these things meant something, but he tried to remember everything in case there were hints. Eren waltzed right into his life. Where was the rule saying he wouldn’t also enter his dreams?

“Tell me about your day,” Eren said, leaving kisses down Levi’s jaw, as though this was something they did everyday. Levi wished it were.

“I met Mikasa and Armin,” Levi said. “We came to Rose together.” Eren pulled back and looked shocked, making Levi wonder if it was a bad idea to tell him. A curious smile broke across his face. 

“I told them I was in love with you. But not in those words,” Levi couldn’t believe what he was saying. Calling them first thing, offering to borrow money for flights, heart set on providing whatever else they might need—what could be more of a confession? “Not in any words, really. But I think they know.” Levi rubbed his thumb over Eren’s chin, forcing him to hold his gaze. “Sorry. This is pretty fast,” he reasoned with himself, replaying what he said and realizing how crazy it probably sounded. “But I know what I want and don’t want."

“I’ll come back to you,” he swore, his eyes brimming with tears. “But don’t look for me. Please.” 

“I’m sorry,” Levi said, and he was. He couldn’t listen to Eren this time. It was ten to one that Eren was worried that Levi could get hurt, or that something could happen that would prompt Levi to push Eren away. 

“You’re beautiful,” Eren repeated. 

“At least come back so you can stroke my ego,” Levi said, making Eren snort. 

Levi had a thought: pleading Eren to come back wasn’t working, so maybe humoring him would.

“Have you found anything?” Suddenly, Eren was gone and so was his office and the barely audible music and Levi was on the air mattress in Jean and Marco’s living room, listening to Armin snore like a bear. 

Levi rolled to his side, hearing but not feeling his back pop. The air mattress had lost quite a bit of air in the night. It was dark outside, so maybe it still was night. Thankful that dreams were just dreams, Levi punched himself for telling Eren he was in love with him. Who does that? He’d known Eren for barely more than a day. Of course it felt a lot longer than a day, but it was still abnormal. 

But something in Levi, between his stomach and chest, throbbed when he thought about how he could probably get along with Eren for a really long time. The rest of his life, even. He could hear their arguments over bills and money in his head. If he pictured it properly he could see himself enveloped with jealousy over something petty. He could imagine the presents they would give each other for their birthdays. Levi was practically one of those crazy people who brought up the subject of having children on the first date. Rubbing his eyes with the palms of his hands, he let go of a sigh he had been holding onto since Eren left.

The air mattress motor began to whirr and re-inflate, scaring the shit out of Levi.

“Holy fuck!” Mikasa responded when Levi screamed. “I was just trying to help!” 

Levi sat up and looked sheepishly at Armin, but realized he was still sleeping and snoring loudly. 

“My bad,” Levi said. "I didn’t see you there.”

“That’s because I’m a ninja. By the way, do you want to go get stuff for smoothies for breakfast? Jean says there’s a market a few blocks away and Marco has a Magic Bullet.” Levi flopped back down and yawned.

“Yeah, gimme five minutes.” 

Perhaps it was wrong of him to think that they would wake Armin up to come along, but being alone with Mikasa was not something Levi had been planning. Her brother was missing with Levi being the last person to have seen him. Furthermore, they were really too much alike, and Levi had always been settled on the idea that if he ever met himself he didn’t think they could be friends. They were silent, keeping a brisk pace down the concrete as the sun began to crest over the rooftops of the shorter buildings. 

“So,” Levi started, intending to start a conversation. He was hoping Mikasa would say something, but instead the “so” just hung in the air for about thirty seconds, as if Mikasa hadn’t even heard him.

“Holy shit!” Mikasa said, pointing at a pole and stopping in front of it. It was full of posters boasting rock shows, comedy acts, and a bright orange notice of cancellation of a fireworks show due to the recent explosion. “There’s an Eric Clapton tribute night at The Garrison on Saturday,” she said, tracing the cool pattern on the poster. What was left unsaid was obvious: _Eren would love to see this_. Schooling her excitement, Mikasa tried to hide behind her red scarf. 

“Hey, it’s only Wednesday,” Levi offered. “We could totally find him by then.” The look on Mikasa’s face was somewhere between skeptical and heartbroken. It tore Levi’s heart a little to see her stoic facade melt away. Then, there on Teresa Lane on the way to the market, Mikasa cried into Levi’s shoulder. 

“I’m sorry,” she said into his coat collar. “I’m sorry, sorry.”

“Why are you sorry? Literally none of this is your fault,” Levi said, his comforting tone coming out more as scolding. “It’s going to be fine.”

“We’re going to find him,” Mikasa whispered, to herself more than Levi, who nodded anyway.

“Let’s go get some fruit,” Levi said, patting Mikasa on the shoulder. “And you can tell me about the embarrassing things Jean has done trying to get your attention.” _Ah, finally_ , Levi thought. Just like her brother—she’s beautiful when she smiles. 

 

*

 

Arms balancing paper bags full of fruit, Levi and Mikasa returned to the apartment. The pull-out bed had been folded back into the couch and the air mattress leaning against the far wall. 

Marco and Armin were in the kitchen, conversing in Italian while Marco poached some eggs and flipped french toast on a large griddle.

“Marco speaks Italian!” Armin said excitedly, waving his arms a little.

“ _No_ ,” Mikasa said sarcastically. “I thought you two were speaking _Klingon_.”

“He speaks that, too!” Armin shouted giddily, saying something to Marco in Klingon. Levi couldn’t hold back his smile. 

“Hope you nerds like rainier cherries,” Mikasa said, shaking her head. “Because Levi bought six pounds of them.”

“It was the most amazing deal on rainier cherries I have ever seen,” Levi said defensively. He glanced at a notepad in front of Armin, full of the addresses and names.

“I made a list of some places we could poke around in that were especially affected by the explosion; places that have been named in the recent articles. And I tried calling Ymir to see if she could give us any tips, by the way,” Armin said, bringing the group back to reality when he saw Levi looking at his list. Reluctant to be the one to do it, he wore a solemn look. “But she didn’t pick up and hasn’t responded to my texts. So. We’ll just—“ 

“We’ll just have to wing it,” Jean said, emerging from his room with wet hair. “That’s what Eren’s doing, too, right? Maybe it’ll work out that we run into each other because of it.”

“The universe tends to be cheeky like that,” Marco said, giving Jean a good morning kiss.

They settled in for breakfast and Armin relayed the names of the places he’d written down to Jean to see if he knew anything about them or if he knew who worked there. Jean knew a few, but most of them were just places he’d seen on the way to work. Together, they resolved to walk to visit the debris and see if they could approach the door. If not, there were a few people they could call and pay a visit to.

To Marco’s dismay, Levi washed the dishes while Mikasa dried. Once they had finished, Marco saw them out the door, then turned the opposite way to catch the bus to work. Jean walked them to the bus stop that would take them in the direction of the explosion.

When the bus arrived, it was already fairly full. There were two open seats, but a few seats apart. 

Levi tried to quash the feeling of betrayal he felt when Mikasa and Armin paired up and left him to sit with Jean. The entire bus was awkwardly silent, waiting for the bus to stir and continue its route. 

“So,” Jean began, twenty seconds after Levi estimated how long Jean could go without talking. Even shorter than expected.

“You want to know about why I’m looking for Eren,” Levi said, not even bothering to look at Jean.

“Are you guys together?” Jean asked hurriedly, trying to command Levi’s attention. Levi himself wasn’t sure how to answer. But after mulling over what had happened in his subconscious during last night’s dream, he answered with conviction. 

“Eren is important to me. I need him to be safe, no matter what. For his own sake, for those two back there,” he gestured to Mikasa and Armin who were watching him and Jean, trying to listen. “And for myself.”

“Yeah, but are you together?” Jean asked again, borderline petulant. Levi pursed his lips and said nothing, but Jean must’ve seen through it. 

“You don’t have to say it,” Jean decided. “I can tell. I just want you to know that I trust you.”

“Thanks for your blessing, dad,” Levi snorted.

“No, that’s not—!” Jean scrambled. “I know—I know I don’t have any right to say what I think is best for Eren, other than myself, but…

"Looking back, Eren was the best thing to happen to me regardless of the hallway accident. My eyes were opened to a lot after I’d met him. He deserves someone whose eyes are already open,” Jean said, fingering the strap of his brown leather bag. “I’ve always meant to apologize to him. I kept putting it off. But now that he’s missing, it’s possible I might not get that chance. But I swear my motivations are not selfish,” Jean said quickly. “I think we  all might be able to be friends again.”

Levi sighed, realizing that Jean was asking for his own blessing rather than giving one to him and Eren. Levi held out his hand. 

“Yeah,” he said, cringing at his own eloquence. Jean took Levi’s hand with gusto—he was eager like Eren, and he could see how their likeness could have been an origin of conflict between them. 

“Ah, next stop,” Jean pushed the stop button after peeking out the window. Dismounting the bus and walking down the street, Levi, Mikasa, and Armin exchanged looks as the evidence of the explosion came into full view. 

From where they stood, the radius of the explosion was clear where the buildings had been collapsed in on themselves, the ones further out only missing walls or edges, but still intact. There were tons of police cars, construction workers, and white government vans everywhere. 

“Holy shit,” Armin said, his swearing seemingly out of character to Levi. 

As they approached the crater, they could see that there was caution tape everywhere. They could see other groups of tourists, locals, and media workers around the area, respectively equipped with smartphones and huge news cameras, all trying to get a closer look. 

“There’s no way we’ll be able to get down there to look closely at the door,” Armin said. Mikasa scowled. Jean tapped his foot in thought. 

“We’ll just have to walk down Ash, then. Talk to the folks I know,” he resolved. The other three followed in tow. 

They spent almost an hour and a half, walking down Ash street and meeting the people Jean was friends with who might be able to give them any hints or leads they hadn’t already picked up on from the mass of articles they had read. There were coffee shop owners, sandwich makers, book keepers, and a nice couple that operated a paint-your-own-pottery shop. Levi’s heart fluttered particularly when he saw the kitsch cat-shaped salt and pepper shakers.

In all honesty, they hadn’t made much headway. It was becoming obvious as the second hour of walking drew nearer. 

“Should we stop to get something to eat?” Armin asked for the sake of the group. 

“I want a panini,” Mikasa pointed at a shop on a corner, painted in red, green and white, boasting “The Best Paninis in Rose City!” 

Just past the panini shop, Levi could see a park with signs boasting a churro stand and public piano. A public piano seemed like something that attracted people who could play _Heart and Soul_ but not much else. Eren would love it.

“Oh my god, Mikasa: you have a sense for these things, Anastasio’s Paninis are the best in town!” Jean was practically drooling. They sat down at one of the tables near the window, between a table of three and another of two. “He might know some stuff, too. He and Marco share a cousin so we come here all the time, and…”

Levi tuned Jean out and looked around the restaurant. Decorating the walls were a bunch of framed family photos, newspaper clippings, and Italian paraphernalia. All of the tables wore pristine doily tablecloths. From the table of three next to them, he could hear one of the boys talking loudly, upset over something. 

“I just can’t believe it almost has two million views and I forgot to monetize it. What kind of artist _am_ I?” 

“Connie, the city was on fire. You were screaming like a baby—there was nothing artistic about the video,” the girl across from him said, shoving an entire breadstick into her mouth.

“I know that, Sasha! But it’s the best video of the explosion—”

“Sorry to interrupt but,” Levi said, leaning over. “You wouldn’t happen to be talking about this, video?” Levi held up his phone where he had the video pulled up from watching it earlier, searching for evidence.

“No worries, man! Yeah that’s me,” the man, apparently Connie, said with a proud smile. “Taken from the heights of Rose Tower. Man, did you know that there are 1848 stairs from the ground to the observation deck of the tower?? My knees still hurt.”

“I didn’t know that,” Levi said, tapping Armin on the shoulder, who was eager to turn his attention to anything other than Jean trying to impress Mikasa. “This is the guy that took the video.” 

Armin nearly choked on his breadstick. He asked Connie a muffled question. 

“What was that?” Connie laughed, slapping Armin on the back.

“Swallow first, twerp,” Levi rolled his eyes.

“He wants to know what else happened to you that night,” the girl named Sasha translated, wolfing down another breadstick. 

“Yes, thank you,” Armin said once his mouth was empty. He pulled out a notepad and pen. Mikasa had taken notice of the new conversation as soon as Armin started coughing. After they had all introduced themselves, Connie recounted his experience.

“Yeah it was a wild night,” Connie said gravely, itching his cropped hair. “Sasha and Marc here were there, too, so chime in whenever, guys. Marc’s my cousin,” Connie added, gesturing to the girl and the boy with thick Harry Potter style glasses. 

“Anyway, we figured we’d all go to the restaurant at the top of Rose Tower to celebrate mine and Sasha’s anniversary. Marc came along because we needed a designated driver.”

“He’s the best damn third wheel I’ve ever known,” Sasha marveled. Marc looked shy.

“Anyway, I wasn’t that inebriated when we felt the tremors, but know that I had been drinking!” Connie said as a disclaimer. “I’m not going to go into detail about how I almost peed myself—because can you imagine being 340 meters above the earth when it’s quaking? Moving on, the tremors subside, and I’ve had my camera out and recording what may have been my last moments. Rose Tower was engineered for the occasional earthquake, as you know, so we weren’t in too much more danger being next to the windows than not. We heard the first explosion and saw the fire, and that’s where the video starts,” Connie said, taking a pause to sip his cola. 

“And after the video ended? What happened after that?” Mikasa prompted, her knuckles white, clutching her glass of water.

“We were instructed to evacuate the tower. We used the emergency stair case to reach the second level and then used the regular stairs from there. There weren’t more than a few hundred people at the tower, but it was still insane… There was a lot of screaming and yelling, some of it probably coming from the three of us. I don’t remember.”

“Marc was definitely crying,” Sasha said.

“So were you, Sasha!” Marc said defensively. Connie continued:

“There weren’t any employees on the ground that had any luck directing people, so everyone just started to head for their houses or to the evacuation shelters, I guess. They shut down the subway and that was our method of transportation. I figured we could go to the cops and show them my video in case they wanted it. We knew the precinct would be slammed but we had no other place to go,” Connie explained, wearing a nervous expression that these strangers would judge him. “Then something weird happened.”

Armin was on the edge of his seat. 

“They’re not going to believe you,” Sasha warned, placing her hand affectionately on Connie’s shoulder. “Remember how the cops reacted? Don’t get your hopes up, babe.” 

“We’ll probably believe you,” Armin and Mikasa said at the same time. Connie sucked on his teeth.

“I saw two guys appear out of nowhere—like they just appeared in front of us in the middle of the street—and they made a run toward the explosion site.” He said in one breath.

The tables were silent for a minute before Armin broke the silence. 

“Did they… did it seem like they emerged from a door? Like they had walked out from a shop or room or something?”

Connie’s face scrunched up, his eyebrows arching in an almost pained manner.

“That’s exactly what it looked like,” he said, letting go of a breath he’d been holding. “I can’t believe you believe me.” Even Sasha and Marc looked surprised. 

“What did they look like?” Jean asked from behind Mikasa. 

The smell of basil was suddenly overwhelming—a waiter was dropping off three paninis for Connie’s table. Sasha took a bite and yelled in pain.

“It’s hot!” Connie shook his head but looked fond. 

“Thank you for your help, Connie,” Levi said, considering tipping Connie for his time. But he wasn’t made of money, so he settled for just saying thanks. 

“Wait! What did they look like?! Do you remember?” Jean asked again. Connie was nodding, mouth dripping with mozzarella. 

“One was super stacked and the other guy was a very tall dude. Blond and brunet respectively.” Jean nodded, searching his mind for any acquaintances he had matching the description. 

They left Connie, Sasha, and Marc to their food and waited for theirs, mulling over this new information.

“Our entire lives, we had never known anyone else like Eren,” Mikasa said, wearing a shocked expression. “And we’ve learned there are at least two others like him.”

“Just two?” Levi said. “Connie said he saw two guys, though.”

“Yes, but one could just be a companion—they only need one key to get around,” Armin reasoned. 

“Wait, then who’s the other?” Jean asked. 

“Ymir.” The three chimed in unison. Jean’s eyes grew wide in realization. 

“All those times she and Christa were late—to work and parties and… it was all a lie…” 

“How are we supposed to find these two guys?” Levi hissed, carding a hand through his hair. “Fuck.” 

“Levi,” someone said. It was so faint that he could have misheard; but Levi’s ears tried to focus on the sound as he was sure someone had said his name. Armin was trying to say something to him, but he ignored him in search of the voice.

“5th and Main,” the same voice hissed. Levi shoved away from the table, rattling the cutlery and his table mates.

“Jesus, Levi!” Mikasa shouted as Levi flew through the front door. He looked at the signs at the corner of the street—he was on 3rd and Driscoll. Main was one street over and 5th was two streets up. 

He ran. 

Levi was in good shape, but his body was weak as though he’d just run a marathon. He tore his scarf from his neck, looking everywhere for a sign, or to hear the voice again. It was Eren.

He probably looked like a madman, racing up the streets. Mikasa and Jean jogged to catch up with Levi. Armin was probably paying the bill like a good citizen. 

“Levi, what the hell is going on?” Jean asked. 

“I heard Eren,” he said, not even believing himself. “He said to come here. Now shh, I’m—“

Before anyone could interject, in the middle of the street, two men appeared before the three of them: the one in the front blond and muscular, the other brunet, tall and lanky—exactly as the men Connie had described. They were opening a door. 

When the men made eye contact with Levi’s group, they froze for a split second, clearly unused to attention when exiting the hallways. Then, the tall one yanked the blond man back to flee through the hallways. 

“ _Like fuck_!” Levi shouted, running after them. He reached for the knob and wrenched the door open with his other hand. Unexpectedly, the blond let go of the doorknob and shuffled back while the taller man looked at Levi with wild, confused eyes, silently asking, “What kind of idiot tries to walk the hallways without a key?” As they let go of the door and ran, Levi followed them in. And as the door closed behind him with an ultimate  _clack_ , he asked himself the same thing. 

 

*

 

The two men were gone, having slipped through another door. Levi stood stock still, afraid to even take a step. The door behind him wouldn't open, and he wondered if any of the doors would open.

As he surveyed the long-rumored hallways (since his eyes had been closed the first time Eren took him through them), he noticed how the walls looked like somewhat like rivers—as if the hallway was constantly in motion along the current of time. All the way long the hallway were doors, sometimes evenly spaced, sometimes crammed right next to each other. The doors and knobs were all unique in color, shape and texture, leading to undisclosed places. 

Glancing at his watch, he committed the hour to memory, even though he had no idea how time worked in the hallways. With little choice, he took a ginger step forward. Left foot moving to meet the right, he put his hands out in front of him to feel for the doors Eren said were sometimes invisible, even to him. Levi knew he didn’t have much of a chance of finding a door this way, but it was futile either way: he’d probably get lost and die in the hallways. 

Or, he’d slip through a door where there was cell service and hopefully not in another country (he couldn’t afford to buy more plane tickets), where he could call Mikasa and Armin and Jean and Erwin and Hanji…

He couldn’t die. Not today. Not here (not without seeing Eren again). 

With newfound confidence, he took a stride forward and fell through a door.

 

*

 

Mikasa clenched and unclenched her fists. That idiot. 

“Oh my _god_ , oh my Jesus fuCkiNg—“ Jean was hysterical, the color drained from his face. “First your brother, now his boyfriend—“ 

Armin jogged up to the scene, with Connie and Sasha in tow. Their cousin Marc was nowhere to be seen.

“Is everything alright?” Armin shouted, out of breath. He looked left, then right. “Where’s Levi?”

Lips tightly pursed, Mikasa couldn’t even find the words.

“He just—up and fucking—he said he heard Eren like some sort of Interstellar ghost bullshit, then when we caught up with him, the the two guys Connie saw opened a door and he ran in like it was the last god damn train to London! Like it was time for god damn dinner! Ran in like a fucking sheep to the—“ 

Mikasa slapped Jean squarely across the face.

“He went in the hallways,” Mikasa paraphrased. 

“I don’t know what to do,” Armin said immediately, incredulous at his own words. “Jean, what’s going to happen to him?”

“He’s gonna tumble. He’s going to fall until he lands.” Jean said, hunched over as if he would be sick while revisiting the unpleasant memory. 

“Hey, what the fuck is going on?” Connie asked, having the gall to sound angry. Pinching the bridge of his nose, Armin took deep breaths.

“I don’t even know anymore.”

 

*

 

After what felt like doing a hundred involuntary somersaults, Levi crashed against the ground. 

His head felt heavy like he was deep underwater, sinuses pinched and ears tight. Everything smelled like laundry soap and cake mixed together. Arms tingling, he had the strange sensation that he couldn’t move his body voluntarily. However, something gave him the force to roll over and empty the contents of his stomach onto the grass beneath him.

Head feeling lighter, he propped himself up on his elbows and tried to look around. Before he could get a good look at his surroundings, he was falling again. This time, though, it felt like he was being pulled to the side instead of down, like on some sort of infinite treadmill. When he moved like this, everything was dark. Or he had his eyes closed. It was the kind of darkness where you couldn’t really tell. 

He stopped moving again, on his feet. “ _Eren_ ,” he croaked, searching for a wall to at least lean against. Although he didn’t dare take a step, he was back to being jerked around again. 

It was impossible to quantify how long this went on for, because sometimes Levi had his watch on, and sometimes it was missing. Sometimes he didn’t have his coat, and in other places he was totally naked. 

He stopped moving again. After he had been still for more than thirty seconds, Levi opened his eyes. 

Beneath him was a white plastic lounge chair, reclined beside a huge cerulean swimming pool. Past the pool was an enormous orange stucco mansion, with swooping Spanish porticos and white trim around the many French windows. A thick, sprawling green jungle surrounded the property, green mountains in the distance. He could hear _The Winner Takes it All_ by ABBA playing weakly from scattered speakers. There was a full martini glass in his hand.

The martini glass slipped from his fingers, and it shattered against the ground. Still feeling woozy, he hazarded standing up. Fully clothed in his winter wear, he was sweating like a fountain, and he almost resolved to taking off his jacket. His heart still set on getting back to Rose, he reluctantly kept it on so he wouldn’t lose it (although that logic didn’t seem to be in place considering earlier events). 

A glance at his watch told him two minutes had past since entering the hallways. Two minutes. His hours of nausea and pain had only endured two meager minutes. In a fit of rage, he grunted and ripped the watch from his wrist and swung his hand high above his head, making to smash the watch against the smooth pavement framing the pool. 

“Hey,” said a voice, stilling his raised arm with a firm hand. 

Levi didn’t dare get his hopes up when he turned around.

_Rightfully so_ , he thought. The person who had interrupted his outburst was not Eren. It was a girl. She looked vaguely familiar… blonde hair, hooked nose. “You were in the subway yesterday,” is what Levi tried to say, but his voice caught in his throat and he coughed violently. The girl just stood there, wearing a stoic look that could rival Mikasa’s. It seemed like she knew what Levi was going to say, but she began to speak and never visited the fact that Levi had recognized her. 

“I’d ask what you were doing in the hallways without a key, but I already know,” she said. She crossed her arms. “I need you to do me a favor.” 

Levi’s knees wobbled as he recovered from his coughing fit. Arm throbbing from where he had landed on it earlier, he clutched at it to try and subdue the pain. He stood up to his full height, which was a only few centimeters taller than the girl. 

“I’m not… I’m not exactly in a position to be doing any favors at the moment. I’m sorry,” Levi tried not to sound too bitter.

“It’s easy,” she said, but there was a temblor in her voice. “Here,” she said, reaching in her pocket and then offering its contents to Levi.

It was a short, tubular key. 

He looked at it and then the girl, at a loss for words. 

“I think you’ve met my friends already. I need you to use this to go back to Rose—they’ll still be there. When you see them, tell them I’ve changed my mind and they won’t be able to find me.”

She was still holding out the key and Levi was still gaping like a fish.

“I’m… I’m not sure I can do that,” Levi rasped. “I sort of chased after and followed them into the hallways. They probably want nothing to do with me if they see me again,” he said.

“Just show them this and they’ll change their minds,” she said, her mouth drawing up into a smirk at the corners. She shook her hand with the key in it again—it was really stressing Levi out.

“Annie,” said a familiar voice from behind. Levi’s throat closed up and his eyes grew wide as he turned around to face Eren.

He was wearing different clothes than when he’d left Levi’s apartment the other morning. Clean and practically sparkling, he shuffled over from the other side of the pool in his casual jeans and sweatshirt and tennis shoes.

Tearing his gaze from Levi only to shoot Annie a brief glance, he walked briskly until he arrived to where they were standing, heading straight for Levi. Taking him in his arms, he buried his face into Levi’s neck and gave a shuddering sigh.

Levi let his eyes fall shut after a moment of wide-open disbelief. He grasped at Eren, verifying his reality. Eren was breathing deeply through his nose, trying not to cry. Chanting _sorry, sorry_ , Levi felt his eyes grow itchy with tears, but they didn’t fall.

“Annie, keep your passkey. I’ll tell Reiner and Bertholdt about your decision,” Eren said, one arm still around Levi, who was leaning into Eren’s side. Levi could usually catch wind of what was going on, but he was too exhausted to even play detective at the moment. Instead, he relished in Eren’s warmth (but felt incongruously cold and sweaty and dirty).

“Eren, please take my key,” her stoic expression fell away, and her voice was tinged with desperation. “I can’t bear having it anymore. I don’t want the choice anymore. I just want to be normal for once,” she pleaded. 

“No one can use the passkey but you, remember?” Eren said, almost taunting.

“Exactly—someone like him won’t even have a use for it. It’ll just be a normal key,” she reasoned, her hand still outstretched in stubborn defiance.

“Annie,” Eren said, gently letting go of Levi. Reflexively, Levi grabbed Eren’s hand as he started to pull away. Eren wore a pained expression when he turned to look at Levi. _Just one second_ , he begged. Levi didn’t let go.

Instead, Eren compromised and held Levi’s hand with his right one, and placed his left hand on Annie’s shoulder.

“Annie. You are strong enough. Take the key and never use it. I know you can do it,” Eren said, smiling brightly like he was about to go on stage for a performance. “And even if you do use the key again, it’s still okay. We’re unfinished men and women,” he said, sounding as though he were quoting someone. 

Annie’s eyes were locked with Eren’s, and her face twisted up with sadness and pain. But she slowly recoiled her hand and held the key over her heart, reluctantly laying claim to it. The tears spilled down her cheeks, and Eren was crying, too. Annie touched Eren’s hand that was still on her shoulder, and she pulled away at last. 

“I hope I never see you again,” Annie said with a smile, beginning to walk away and toward the entrance of the mansion.

“I hope I never see you again, too” Eren echoed. This had to be some sort of inside joke, because both were smiling and neither looked like they wanted to say goodbye at all. 

Annie mouthed _thank you_ from the door and then disappeared into the mansion. Levi thought Eren would stare at the door a little longer, but he turned his attention to Levi immediately.

“Levi—holy shit, Levi, I’m so sorry, I’m a piece of _shit_ , I’m—“ Levi pulled Eren into a weak kiss. 

“Shut up and take me home so I can shower,” he said, kissing him again. 

 

*

 

Eren obeyed. Finding a door, they slipped through the halls and into Levi’s apartment. 

“Oops, should’ve mentioned we were staying in Rose City,” Levi said. “But I would prefer to wash up here than bother Marco.”

“You came to Rose?!” Eren asked, shocked. Levi’s mouth drew to the side in puzzlement. “And who’s Marco?” he added. Hadn’t Levi told Eren this already? Ah, he remembered— 

“Can you go into people’s dreams with your key?” Levi asked. Eren’s eyes went wide.

“No. I mean, I don’t think so. Why?” 

“You were in my dream last night, and I told you we came to Rose to find you.” Levi didn’t tell him that he also mentioned being in love with Eren. 

“It must’ve felt pretty real then,” Eren said quietly. “I’m so sorry for leaving, Levi.” 

Levi didn’t have the energy to argue at the moment. He needed to get clean and get back to Rose.

“We can talk about it later. First of all,” Levi began, pulling out his phone. “I’m going to text your sister.”

“You have Mikasa’s number? Wait—is she in Rose, too? You went together?!” Eren asked. “How much have I missed?!” Levi allowed himself a smile as he typed a message to Mikasa. He also looked at the clock on his phone—it had only been a short fourteen minutes since he’d run into the hallways. It felt as though half a day had gone by.

**Found Eren. Well, he found me. Need to shower, be back in Rose in a half hour. Meet at Jean’s place?**

The second the text was delivered, Mikasa was typing in response.

**Hurry up** was Mikasa’s reply. 

“Alright, and secondly,” Levi said, shrugging off his coat and hanging it up. He grabbed Eren’s hand. “We’re taking a shower.”

“I showered this morning,” Eren complained.

“I’m not letting you out of my sight,” Levi said, arching an eyebrow. He was sort of trying to be sexy, but he was so tired it came off as bitter. Eren wilted under his gaze. Levi squeezed his eyes shut, trying to quash an impending headache. 

“Eren,” he whispered, pressing flush against him. Running a weak hand down Eren’s back, he locked eyes with him. “I forgive you.” 

“I’m back,” Eren choked, like he was believing the situation even less than Levi. They hobbled to the shower and stripped down, stood beneath the soporific hot shower stream together and planted lazy kisses on each other. Eren rubbed shampoo through Levi’s hair, massaging his scalp. Levi examined Eren’s body for any scratches or bruises, but all he could find were the fading markings he had left their first night together. 

When they were finished, Eren watched Levi get dressed and pull a new, clean coat and scarf on.

They joined hands and walked through a door...

 

*

 

…Straight into Jean’s bathroom. 

“Oops,” Eren laughed. “Sometimes this happens if I’m going somewhere specific that I’ve never been to before.” 

The others must have heard the clamor, because they were all looking at them when they emerged from the bathroom. 

“Wow, nice place you got here, Jean—” Eren began until he saw the looks on his friends’ faces. 

They were all standing in the living room, looking wrecked. Armin had a hand clamped over his mouth, and Mikasa just looked mad. Jean was the first person to walk over to Eren.

“I’m sorry,” he said. Eren smiled and shook his head; he’d forgiven Jean years ago. Levi relinquished Eren’s hand so he could hug his friend. Armin and Mikasa ran over next, and Jean made room so they could dote. Still smiling, he shot a relieved look at Marco, who was nodding encouragingly from the other side of the room, eyes glistening. Jean turned to Levi next, but Levi spoke first.

“I think you overreacted to the hallways, Jean,” he teased.

“Shut the fuck up, Levi,” Jean grinned. “Did you cry?”

“Nah, but I threw up,” he laughed. 

“I’m glad you made it back,” Jean said genuinely. Unable to place why, Levi felt like everything was suddenly easier—talking, smiling. Maybe because he’d just experience the hardest thing he’d ever faced in his life. 

When Mikasa and Armin finished fawning over Eren, they started scolding him.

“And you didn’t even take your phone!” Mikasa ranted. “Do you even know what year it is?!” 

“What if Levi hadn’t told us about you, Eren?” Armin challenged. “Would you even be here right now?” Eren had the decency to appear sorry, but when he looked at Levi, his expression was foreign, yet ever fond—it was love. 

“I owe him quite I bit, don’t I?” Eren marveled, sauntering over to where Levi was leaning against the wall. He rubbed at Levi’s cheek with his thumb. Realization came over his face. “Wait, what day is it?”

“Wednesday the 27th,” Armin said.

“Alright, and it’s like, 5? Should we get some dinner? And then I can get you guys up to speed with what we gotta do.” He said nonchalantly. Marco stood up quickly, finally having a moment to shine.

“I’ll whip something up,” he said, looking determined to make another good impression on one of Jean’s friends. He made a beeline for the kitchen.

“Who _is_ he?” Eren whispered to the group.

“My husband,” Jean whispered back.

“Holy shit!” Eren said, craning his neck to get another look at Marco. “Get it, Jean!” 

Marco had been thawing some salmon; he carefully seasoned it and threw it in the oven, simultaneously boiling a pot of green fettuccine. When the salmon emerged steaming from the oven, Marco painted it in a thick, golden lemon-ginger glaze, and topped the fettuccine with an onion cream cheese spread. Jean set the table and sliced a loaf of bread that had just come out of their bread-maker. The entire apartment smelled amazing.

Taking a huge bite, Eren hummed around his fork. Levi had scooted his chair close to Eren’s so he could continue leaning against him to convince himself this was all happening (and because he was about to fall over from exhaustion… how did Eren navigate the hallways without turning into a spin top?). They held hands underneath the table, and Levi tried to eat with his left hand.

Dinner was delicious.

“It’s like pre-Thanksgiving,” Mikasa said in awe at the amount of food.

“You could probably give that panini man a run for his money,” Armin said around a glass of white wine. 

“ _Anastasio non è un cuoco migliore di me_ ,” Marco said slowly. “ _Ma i suoi panini sono migliori_.” Armin laughed and Mikasa rolled his eyes. Jean just smiled at Marco, stupidly in love. 

“What did he say?” Eren asked Armin.

“Who cares?” Jean shrugged, going back to his salmon. 

Outside, it was already pitch dark. Mikasa, swirling her glass of wine, looked out the window thoughtfully. Then she turned her gaze to Levi, who was visibly having trouble staying upright. 

“Eren,” Mikasa started. “Is what you have to tell us so urgent that it can’t wait until tomorrow?” Eren’s mouth drew to the side in confusion.

“It’s only Wednesday, right? We’ve totally got time. Why, though? I thought you’d want to know right away,” he asked. Mikasa pointed to Levi’s sleepy figure.

“Your boyfriend’s exhausted from hallway gymnastics,” she said. Levi gave her a weak thumbs up. _Solid wingman move_ , he thought. Mikasa’s perceptiveness was at last in his favor.

“Oh my god, of course it can wait. Marco, where can Levi get some sleep?” Eren said, turning his full attention to Levi.

“We’ll make the bed,” Marco said, nodding to Jean. They stood up and made for the living room.

“Are you okay, Levi?” Eren asked. Levi’s eyelids felt like anvils had been tied to them; no matter how hard he tried to open them, they kept falling shut.

“M’fine,” he slurred.

“Do you need any painkillers, Levi?” Armin asked. “I’m going to get him some water and ibuprofen,” he resolved, heading for the kitchen.

Eren stood up and leaned over Levi’s chair. Levi had turned and was trying to stand up. Despite trying his hardest, his resolve had worn thin.

“Could you, uhm,” he began to ask Eren. Hazarding a glance at Mikasa, she read the mood and followed Armin to the kitchen.

“Can I what, babe?” Eren asked. Levi tried to get the words out, feeling small in his chair and looking down at his stubborn legs. “Want me to carry you to bed?” Eren could have taunted or teased, but he was so sincere, and made Levi's heart swell. Nodding, Eren responded by scooping Levi up so that he had one arm hooked around his back and one for support under his bum.

It felt like the most intimate thing they had done together yet. Eren lay Levi down, helping him out of his clothes and into a loose shirt. Marco and Jean had set out a second pillow for Eren, and, regardless of how early it was, Eren took off his jeans and lay beside Levi. When they were finally adjusted and the inflatable mattress had stopped groaning under their weight, Eren traced Levi’s cheekbones with his fingers.

“So Mikasa called you my boyfriend,” he said quietly.

“You like that?” Levi asked, already half-asleep.

“A lot,” Eren said, his own voice growing sluggish.

Levi hummed. “Me too.”

“Boyfriend,” Eren repeated.

They fell asleep at the same time.

 

* 

 

When Levi woke up, his eyelids were still heavy. He had slept so hard he hadn’t dreamed at all. Or maybe it was because Eren was sleeping there, one arm thrown protectively around Levi. Levi wiggled a little closer, and the creak of the air mattress incited a drowsy Eren, who obliged Levi by pulling him so that they lay flush against each other. Levi snaked a hand out of the blankets and into the hair at Eren’s neck. 

Eren tried to kiss Levi, but Levi pushed him away and banned him from kissing until he brushed his teeth.

“Don’t get your leftover garlic-onion-fish breath all over me,” he said in a raspy half-whisper, wary of Mikasa and Armin on the couch. It wasn’t easy, but Levi resisted Eren’s pout. Instead, Eren settled for kissing the top of Levi’s head and all over his shoulders and arms, which Levi permitted.

“I don’t even know your middle name,” Levi said suddenly, though Eren was not deterred from his closed mouth kiss-peppering responsibilities.

“Is this a prerequisite for boyfriendship?” he chortled. "It’s Asim,” Eren said as he moved down and started kissing Levi’s chest, looking up at him with his big green eyes. “What’s yours?”

Levi snorted and looked over his shoulder to ensure that Mikasa and Armin weren’t witnesses to this display of affection.

“I don’t have a middle name,” Levi said, breath hitching a bit when Eren’s fingers ghosted over a nipple.

“No way! It’s probably something embarrassing so you won’t tell me, huh?” Eren laughed, his hands still but spread out over Levi’s abdomen.

“I swear I don’t,” Levi said. “Hardly anyone on my dad’s side of my family does. They’re Japanese, so that’s why,” he explained. Eren nodded, looking thoughtful.

“I wish you could meet my family,” he said softly.

“I already have,” Levi said, gesturing to the couch. “They’re pretty okay.” Eren’s smile was from ear to ear. They stopped talking for a bit; Eren ran his hands over strands of Levi’s hair, and he traced the shape of his face and lips with his long fingers. Levi laughed when his started to study his nose.

“What? I want to remember what it looks like if my eyes are closed,” Eren had said this as though it were nothing, but Levi’s stomach flipped in fondness at the comment. 

“That doesn’t even make sense,” he said, hiding in Eren’s shoulder.

“Sure it does,” Eren said, stroking Levi’s hair. “I’m gonna give you a middle name,” he added randomly.

“Wonderful,” Levi deadpanned. 

A dainty yawn could be heard from the couch.

“Armin is cute even when he yawns,” Eren said with an eye roll. “Levi Harold Ackerman.”

“Shut the fuck up,” Armin said groggily.

“Adorable,” Levi agreed. “And no to Harold."

“I’m the toughest guy who ever lived,” Armin said, raising his fists while still laying down. “Who wants to fight?”

“Calm down, Tyler Durden,” Mikasa said, now awake and giving Armin a push. “It’s barely eight o’clock.”

It was earlier than Levi thought. “I figured I’d sleep more,” he said aloud.

“Me too,” Eren agreed. “Do you feel better?” He asked, feeling Levi’s forehead with the back of his hand. “Levi Remington Ackerman?” Levi flicked Eren gently on the shoulder.

“Too long.”

“Deal. On a scale of a paper cut to getting hit by a truck, how would you rate your pain?”

Levi thought for a moment. He almost said “bicycle accident” until he remembered seeing Christa all bruised up and weak at the hospital. Even though he was in pain, he didn’t appear hurt like Christa had.

“It feels like I got in a fistfight and barely won,” Levi decided. 

“At least you won,” Mikasa offered. “We stayed up and had a little too much wine after you two fell asleep. Feels like I _lost_ ,” she groaned.

“Seconded,” Armin huffed.

“All of these are bad things and I feel personally responsible!” Eren said frowning. For some reason, it made Levi giggle.

Mikasa and Armin sat up on their elbows, looking serious.

“Did you just laugh?” Armin asked.

“That was a giggle, Armin,” Mikasa corrected. “It was _cute_.”

“Isn’t he winsome?” Eren crooned.

“Fuck you,” Levi said, still smiling.

“It almost cured my headache,” Mikasa said, standing up and putting her hands on her hips. “Almost.” She made for the kitchen and bottle of ibuprofen that was on the counter. 

Eren, Levi, and Armin eventually followed suit, tidying up the living room and making preparations for breakfast. Digging through the cupboards, Armin unearthed a waffle maker with a triumphant cheer.

“Armin is the Waffle King,” Eren explained, sounding less than thrilled. “We have to call him that when he makes waffles.”

“Because I make the best waffles,” Armin added, shaking his whisk at Levi. “I hope you’re a fan of tiramisu.”

Armin put Mikasa to work on a chocolate mousse while he began on his waffle batter. Eren was on strawberry duty, washing and cutting them into slices. Levi was instructed to stand next to Armin and watch “the master at work.” Levi was pretty sure Armin was still a little drunk from whatever they’d had the night before. 

“They key is the vanilla and cinnamon,” Armin explained, adopting a French accent and repeating himself. “Zey are ze key ingredients.” Levi turned to look at Eren, who was rolling his eyes like he had to deal with this regularly.

Jean and Marco joined the group as Armin was plating the waffles, scooping heaps of chocolate mousse on top of a layer of whip cream. The strawberries were ornamentally placed in and around the waffle. He dropped chocolate chips on top.

“Smells amazing,” Marco hummed, grabbing a handful of forks from the silverware drawer and setting the table. “We woke up just in time.”

Everyone sat at the table and watched as Armin (who had refused all help) balanced five precarious plates of tiramisu waffles on both of his arms, on a slow walk from the kitchen to the adjacent dining room. 

“Waffles a la Waffle King!” Armin said loudly, and everyone grabbed a plate. Returning swiftly to the kitchen to fetch his own plate, he joined the group and they enjoyed breakfast.

“Thank you, Waffle King,” Jean said, bowing to Armin. “You have graced us with unmatched pleasures.”

“All hail Waffle King!” Eren shouted, mouth full.

“A well-deserved name,” Levi agreed. It was too sweet a breakfast, but it was delicious and undoubtedly blew whatever Shari’s could come up with out of the water in both the flavor and service departments. He was willing to admit that they were almost better than the ones he and Eren had made their first morning together—Levi would have to up his waffle game.

Breakfast was over too soon, and it was felt by everyone at the table. They had to go back to real life—which was whatever Eren had to tell them about his recent forays into the hallways.

“So,” Eren began, carefully setting his fork down. “We should probably. Talk about things.” Mikasa groaned loudly.

“You’ll have to get to the point, Eren. I have a feeling we don’t have much time to sort all this out, and it was a lucky break that we found you so quickly.” Eren looked sheepish again, but sat up straighter.

“Alright,” he started. “There are two people who are after my passkey.” He looked at everyone’s face, trying to gauge their reactions. Although Marco was the person who probably knew the least about Eren and what was going on, he was the first to speak up.

“Are you in danger?” Eren sighed and rested his chin in his hand.

“Probably, but I’m not worried about it,” he said finally. “I think, when it comes down to it, we can just, like, talk it out. I have a plan, you know,” he said, sensing the skepticism. 

“Tell us from the beginning, Eren,” Levi said. “Catch us up to where you are.” Eren bit his lip, but eventually nodded and began his recount of the past two days:

“So after I left from Levi’s, I headed straight for the epicenter of the explosion in Rose. I knew it would probably be blocked off, but it was my best bet. Furthermore, if I could open the door, I knew that it would answer all the questions I had. 

“Unsurprisingly, there were police cars and vans everywhere. I tried walking the hallways to see if I could get close to the door, but I kept getting twisted around. Something about it was pushing back. 

"That’s when I ran into Annie,” he said, looking at Levi. He took a sip of water and continued. “She was trying to get to the same door and having the same issue trying to approach it. We were beyond surprised to run into each other. It was my first time meeting someone else who had a key,” he told Jean and Marco. “I wanted to be excited, but something about Annie’s nervous demeanor made me cautious. She told me that she ran with two other guys, and that they called their keys Passkeys instead of Skeleton Keys like I called it, and that they were self-proclaimed nomads. That they were looking for a specific door.

“I sometimes have trouble getting to the right doors, but Annie said they had no idea where the door was and they had been looking for it for four years…” Eren trailed off, looking a bit sad. “I asked her where this door led and why they were looking for it. Why so long for one door? In four years, couldn’t you have already gotten there by normal means of travel?” Eren face drained of color suddenly. “She said that it wasn’t somewhere you could fly or drive to.”

“Eren,” Mikasa began, recognizing something about Eren’s behavior. “What did you do?”

“She said that life had just screwed them over so many times that they wanted to leave this one behind and start over, and that they were trying to get to a different _dimension_ ,” he blurted. “I have never… I mean, I can go back or ahead in time for a few minutes, but nothing more than that, not to a different dimension. I mean scientists are still conjuring up theories about that sort of thing! There was no way it was real, or so close to us. Or that’s what I thought,” he said, stammering. He took a moment to think about his words. “I don’t know how I did it, but after she described this place to me, I took out my key and opened the door.

“I peeked inside, I had to. But it was dark where I opened the door, I couldn’t see a thing,” he admitted. “In any case, Annie flipped her shit after just looking inside for a minute, then told me she had to get her friends if they were going to do this.” Eren sighed and played with his fork for a moment.

“Annie left and came back with her two friends, Reiner and Bertholdt. You’ve met those two, now. It was honestly really cool to talk with people who had similar experiences. They told me about the places they’d been, some rules I wasn’t aware of… We chatted for a while, but after we finished is where things took a turn.

“Reiner made this offhand comment about how I hardly used my passkey at all, so I shouldn’t be allowed to keep it,” he sighed, fingering the key around his neck. “That definitely hurt; the key is part of me, part of my experience.

“Reiner suggested that I give up my key so that they could have it to use the dimensional door I had opened. I refused immediately,” he said. “They tried to take it by force after that, but luckily I am highly trained in the art of Running Away From My Problems,” Eren laughed. “I slipped through a door and sat in a cafe for a long time, trying to think about what I should do. After their change of heart, I knew they were probably involved in the explosion. But I needed to know the rest of the story. I came up with an idea to win them over.

“But that’s when I heard Levi call my name,” Eren turned to Levi and his eyes were glassy. “It hit me hard: he was looking for me and somehow made it into the hallways. There was a chance that Reiner and Bertholdt had gotten a hold of him. I was worried sick, and it reminded me of when Jean got lost in the hallways.” 

“Took you _forever_ ,” Jean huffed.

“It took me less than a minute!” Eren barked. “Time is different in the hallways.”

“I heard your voice,” Levi interrupted. “You told me to go to fifth and main—that’s where I saw those two coming out of a door.”

“I don’t know who spoke to you” Eren said. “Because I didn’t know they would be there. It wasn’t me.” Levi wasn’t quite sure what to do with this information.

“How did you know where to find me?” Levi asked instead.

“I just looked through the hallway. It was easy because Annie was there, too,” he explained although it made no sense at all to Levi.

“Annie tried to pawn her key off on Levi; it was sort of obvious from earlier, but she revealed that she had no desire to go with them anymore. She just wanted to live her idea of a normal life. We said goodbye and left.

“And here I am now,” sighing, Eren’s shoulders dropped. “Making trouble for everyone on Thanksgiving day.”

“Here _we_  are,” Armin corrected, placing a hand on Eren’s shoulder. “Going to get through it and enjoy a delicious Thanksgiving dinner."

“Probably not dinner though, let’s be real,” Jean added.

“I think you made the right choice refusing to give up your key,” Marco agreed, ignoring Jean. “You must be the only person who has this ability to open the dimensional doors,” he pondered. “That’s why they wanted it.”

“We have to figure out what they did to cause the explosion,” Jean resolved, piping in. “Otherwise they might do it again.”

“Agreed,” Eren said. “Which is why we look for them tomorrow during the firework show. If there are any explosions, we might be able to cover it up as a firework accident so as to avoid giving the door issue any more coverage.”

“They cancelled the firework show,” Levi said, remembering the bright orange cancellation flyer on the pole where the Eric Clapton Tribute Show poster made Mikasa cry.

“What! Noooo, my plan!” Eren whined.

“ _That_ was your big plan?” Jean asked, unimpressed. “Come on Jaeger, you can do better than that.” 

“It was short notice! And I wanted to see the fireworks!”

“You might not see dinner if these guys find you, Eren. We have to get rid of them,” Mikasa urged.

“I just need to find and talk to them. Wait, what if we bought our own fireworks and had a show?”

“Fireworks are illegal in the city,” Marco added.

“Can’t you just find them in the hallways?” Levi asked. “And then confront them?”

“If I try to find them, it will be easier for them to find me and catch me off guard. And the hallways are literally the worst place for a confrontation.” Eren said. “So I'm avoiding the hallways for that reason.”

The group was silent, considering any possible solution they could come up with.

“I have only one other idea,” Eren said finally, adding a caveat: “But it involves me making a fool of myself in front of lots of people.”

“You know we’re in no matter what,” Armin rolled his eyes.

“Alright,” Eren said, 

“Public piano,” Levi said out of nowhere.

“Yeah! That’d be perfect!” Eren said.

“There’s one by the panini place we didn’t end up eating at yesterday,” he said flatly.

“How is this going to help anyone?” Jean interrupted, crossing his arms.

“If Reiner and Bertholdt confront me, they can’t do anything drastic if there are lots of people around,” Eren reasoned. “At least any door shenanigans. They might still hurt me,” he added. “But it’s the best option we have, I think. So I have to draw them out by putting myself at a tiny bit of risk. And then I’ll talk to them. I have confidence,” he said, smiling brightly.

“Does this sound like some Will Ferrel holiday movie to you, Eren?” Jean asked. “That sort of thing never really works out. They’re not going to convoke a meeting just because you’re playing their favorite Beatles song in the park. And they won’t give a shit about your self-sacrificing.” He shrugged.

Looking at Eren’s wilting face, Levi wished Jean wasn’t right. Even if the two did come, they seemed like the type that wouldn’t think twice about hurting anyone who got in their way.

“Do you have any better ideas, Jean?” Eren asked, raising his voice a little. Armin touched Eren’s hand from across the table.

“Jean’s right, Eren,” he said softly. “We’ll come up with something else.” Eren’s jaw twitched like he was going to speak, but he bit the inside of his cheek and stood down.

“So the hallways are off limits,” Mikasa said, holding up a finger to start counting options. “We can’t leave Rose City,” she held up another finger.

“No public piano,” Jean muttered and Mikasa added it to the list.

“What is the best thing we could do right now?” Marco asked. “Even before we consider meeting these guys. What information are we lacking?” Eren thought for a moment, and Levi brushed his thumb over Eren’s knuckles to maybe help him along.

“Honestly, our best bet is probably me opening the door that was in the middle of the explosion,” Eren said at last.

“It’s surrounded by cops and government types,” Jean scoffed. “There’s no way we could get close without you getting caught opening it,” he declared. Armin coughed from his side of the table.

“What are you thinking?” Mikasa asked, sounding somewhere between nervous and excited.

“We just need to distract them,” Armin said, his small smirk edging toward maniacal. As straight-laced as Armin came across, it was obvious that he had a secret penchant for the thrill of breaking the rules.

“Armin,” Jean warned.

“What distracts cops and government workers the most?” Armin wondered, fingers steepled and begging a response from his audience.

“Other than us committing some sort of crime?” Jean whined. Levi had no idea where this was going, but he was eager to find out.

“Drugs,” Marco contributed, ignoring Jean’s whining. Armin hummed a skeptical high note, pursed his lips, and tilted his head in thought, eventually shaking his head and rejecting the idea.

“Aliens,” Mikasa offered.

“ _Aliens_ ,” Armin repeated, laughing.

“I don’t think we should commit or even pretend to commit any crimes,” Levi interrupted. “Just saying.” Armin’s smile faded but it didn’t disappear completely. 

“You’re right, Levi,” he said. “I do have another idea, though.” He looked at Eren. “And I think Eren will get his fireworks after all.” Eren’s face lit up as Armin began to describe his plan in detail.

 

*

 

It was a busy Thanksgiving Thursday night in downtown Rose where the roads had been strung with blue and white fairy lights and festooned with thick evergreen garlands. A dry and frigid air settled over the streets. Bundled up in thick coats and scarves, there were people everywhere, from couples eating dinner to families promenading and friends shopping. Despite the weather, the atmosphere of the entire city was undeniably warm.

Levi and Eren walked arm in arm, meandering down Main. 

“Are you hungry at all?” Eren asked Levi, who shook his head.

“Honestly, my stomach is still upset after yesterday. Are you?” Eren looked apologetic and shook his head. Opening his mouth to say something, Levi cut him off. 

“Don’t apologize again,” he warned. “We talked about this. It’s over, you found me.”

“But it’s not over yet,” Eren countered as they got closer to the crater. Yellow caution tape littered the area, but there were significantly fewer white vans and police cars around the area. There was, however, a bobcat and other digging machinery that had not been there before. It appeared that they had yet to break ground, likely due to the cold weather and present holiday. A few officers stood in a group, hands on their hips, swaddled with heavy coats.

Eren and Levi stood at the edge of the crater, joining a few other clusters of people observing the wreckage. They glanced at the door, then looked up toward Rose Tower. From the right side of the crater, they waved to Jean, who had his hands in his pockets, his expression somewhere between extreme concern and forced nonchalance. He gave a solemn nod, putting his arm around Marco who was next to him. On the far side of the crater, Mikasa stepped up to the edge and made eye contact with Eren, giving a nod that she was ready.

It wasn’t like they had a chance to rehearse this—they only had a few moments to make everything work in their favor. The point of this part was to get civilians away from the crater and get the nearby authorities to focus on something else other than the door so that Eren could open it.

Levi was the only person who could keep a straight face, so he was the designated signaler. He gave Mikasa a discreet wave, and she nodded again, and turned around to head toward Fern, a street in Rose known for being having a high concentration of banks. After all, they were closed for the holiday. It was the perfect day to rob a bank, right?

Of course, they weren’t going to actually rob anyone.

Levi’s wave also set Jean and Marco off, turning around to head to where Fern met Seneca, on the opposite side of where Mikasa would be.

“I don’t know what’s going to be on the other side of that door, Levi,” Eren said, his voice shaking a bit. “I’m a little scared.”

“Just ask yourself: what’s the worse that could happen?” Levi said, trying to assuage his anxiety.

“We could die from whatever caused that explosion in the first place,” Eren said.

“Okay true, but,” Levi began. “Dying isn’t the worse thing that could happen.” he offered, remembering the hell of falling blindly. Eren mulled over Levi’s words for a moment and then broke out into a wide smile. His advice was in no way comforting, but Eren took solace in it and smiled, pulled Levi close, kissing him squarely on the lips. He intended it to be short, but it ended up lasting until someone nearby cleared their throat pointedly.

“Alright,” Levi said, pulling out his cell phone. 

“Levi Wayne Ackerman, if we die, I’m glad I met you,” Eren said softly, grabbing his own phone and dialing.

“We’re not going to die,” Levi said, raising the phone to his ear. “I like you, too, Eren.”

“Gross,” Mikasa’s voice could be heard from the phone. Eren gave a laugh as Jean answered. 

“This really isn’t too funny,” Jean said nervously. Marco’s faint voice could be heard playfully saying _yes it is, Jean_. 

“Are you guys ready?” Eren asked. The two gave an affirmative from the phone.

“You on the roof yet, Mikasa?”

“I’m ready,” she said, slightly out of breath. 

“Alright, let ‘em have it,” Levi said, hanging up and reaching for the package in his coat. 

From the rooftop of Rose Mutual, a cloud of grey smoke erupted into the evening sky, accompanied by thunderous whip-cracks. More smoke billowed, and Jean and Marco, followed by a few other surprised citizens, ran down toward the crater with heavy and panicked footfalls.

“Everybody clear the area! There’s something going on at the bank!” Jean bellowed. Thankfully, the crowd around the crater had no issue taking orders, especially as Mikasa’s smoke and noise bombs continued to erupt from the block away. The officers who had been casually conversing were at attention and heading straight for Rose Mutual. As the crowds thinned and the police called for backup, Levi prayed Mikasa was already off the roof and heading for the rendezvous point. Jean and Marco kept yelling and were running toward Levi and Eren.

Finally, they dropped into the crater and made a run for the door, dropping smoke bombs to block their faces from any nearby CCTVs. From behind, Jean and Marco tossed two smoke bombs to help cover the trail. Surrounding almost entirely by the cloud of smoke, Levi and Eren reached the door and entered without any trouble.

 

*

 

There was nothing different about this hallway. Or at least as far as Levi was concerned, it looked exactly like the one from the day before. Maybe the doors were different, but the walls still resembled a coursing river, and there was the pungent smell of bleach and sugar.  But there were no explosions, and they were safe. He held tightly to Eren’s hand.

The only thing predominantly noticeable was the door with a red X painted over it.

“That’s the door,” Eren said, pointing to the one with the X on it. They approached the door cautiously, Eren guiding Levi with vigilance.

“We’re not going to go inside, are we?” Levi wondered, thinking aloud. 

“I’m just going to peek,” Eren said. “You don’t have to look.”

With that, Eren ran his free hand over the dull, crumbling paint and settled on the door knob. He gave it a wiggle, and it relented under his hand, creaking open. Eren peeked his head in for possibly a whole minute, then closed the door firmly.

“What did you see?” Levi asked after Eren remained silent while they started walking away from the door, shaking his head.

“Nothing that looked like a reason to go,” he said through gritted teeth. “It’s a world in war. A nasty one, too.”

In the end, the answers didn’t come as easily as they thought they would. Eren began murmuring something, leaving a trail with his words for Reiner and Bertholdt to follow.

Arriving at a shiny varnished door, they pushed through the door and into the lobby of the observation deck of Rose Tower. Armin ran over to where they were.

“Mikasa, Jean and Marco are in line to come up the elevator,” he explained, shooting a text to the group to update them that Eren and Levi had made it. “I’m afraid they might evacuate the tower after our little stint, though.” Having sent the message, he returned to looking over both of them, breath held. “What did you see?”

“Armin, I’m not sure I know,” Eren admitted, raking one hand through his hair, still holding onto Levi with his other hand. “The place they want to go is a war zone. There were… there was fire and blood and...” Eren trailed off. “It makes no sense,” he declared. Armin appeared surprised but reluctant to believe anything without the full details of the story.

As if choreographed, Reiner and Bertholdt walked into the lobby through a door near the gift shop while the elevator opened and Jean, Marco, and Mikasa emerged. They faced each other like Old West gunslingers. Levi prayed there were no guns to be involved.

“Eren,” Bertholdt spoke for the first time Levi had encountered him, his voice was deep and soft. He was of great height, but his shoulders hunched over at the top, giving him the appearance of being much smaller—like a potentially evil Mr. Rogers. Straightening a bit, he cleared his throat. “Did you see?”

Eren became truculent but hesitated to respond. He took a deep steadying breath and spoke softly.

“I saw but I don’t understand,” he said, voice firm. “I don’t understand how you could dare ask me to give up my key for that place."

“We’re not asking you to understand, Eren,” Bertholdt started. “We’re asking you to help us.”

“I’m not giving you my key,” Eren repeated. Reiner and Bertholdt exchanged a long look, silently communicating something.

“Why don’t you just open the door for them and let them in?” Levi asked. Reiner and Bertholdt whipped their heads around to look at Levi, who was confused as to why this option hadn’t come up before. The two men wore conflicted looks. Armin read them instantly.

“They want to be able to change their minds,” he said, picking apart their body language. “They want to be able to choose—to come back if necessary.” This only frustrated Eren more.

“Not everybody gets that choice or luxury! Just because bad things happen doesn’t mean you can run away from them and forget about them!” Eren’s raised voice was turning heads in the observation deck, and Levi held onto Eren’s arm to reel him in. “Even if I left this life, there would still be people who noticed, who were affected by me and my presence and being. Aren’t there people like that for you?!”

“There aren't,” Reiner said, puffing out his chest at his full height. “There aren't, Eren, and that’s why we’re asking you to help us out.”

“You’re asking me to give up too much,” Eren said, sounding defeated, his shoulders dropping. “I can’t give that part of me away.”

“Why not?” Mikasa asked. Levi bit his cheek, wishing she hadn’t said anything. The key was like Eren’s security blanket; he could understand why she would ask Eren to let go of it, but at the same time, Eren’s key had a lot more uses than a blanket. “Why can’t you, Eren?"

“Because he wants to be able to choose, too,” Bertholdt declared.

The air was stale with tension, and no one knew what to say.

“What happened to cause the explosion?” Armin asked. They weren’t getting any closer to resolving the issue.

“We had finally opened a door to the place where we’re headed, but a bomb came sailing through and we had to open another door so that it wouldn't blow us and the hallway to smithereens,” Reiner explained, wearing a sour look on his face. “Pure luck that it happened in Rose and just after the earthquake." 

“And the odds you’ll open the right door again?” Armin ventured. Reiner huffed, getting angrier while Bertholdt tried to stave off his oncoming temper.

“Considering it’s been four years of fruitless searching, and we’ve only found two doors that were both flukes, I’d wager it was at least a one in ten thousand chance,” Bertholdt explained.

“I’m sick of waiting,” Reiner coughed. “And I’m sick of asking nicely,” he said, reaching for something in his coat pocket and Levi was sure it was a weapon and that they were all about to die.

Suddenly, Eren disappeared through a door, leaving them to deal with two angry and likely armed men. Reiner’s hand stilled in his coat pocket as he and Bertholdt look around frantically for him. In Reiner’s hand, Levi recognized the flash of a polished black barrel of a Glock.

Before anyone could move or say anything, and barely too quickly to register, Eren had opened a wide door from behind Reiner and Bertholdt. Beyond them, Levi could barely make out the windy-walls of the hallways and then the backdrop of a town with red-tile rooftops and cobblestone roads. Eren had opened the infamous door to Reiner and Bertholdt’s world behind another door. Grabbing the collars of their jackets, he yanked them into the hallways with sheer force that Levi didn’t know he possessed. They tumbled backwards, too shocked to move or say anything. Eren jumped forward as they fell into the strange world, the doors shutting promptly in front of them.

The observation deck was silent.

“Did anyone see that?” Eren asked sheepishly. “They gave me a really good idea, opening two doors at once. I’ve never hopped around like that before,” he added, walking back over to his group, taking notice that a few patrons in the tower had seen his display. His friends were in shock.

“Is it—is it over?” Mikasa asked. “I barely—what the—“

Levi slapped Eren squarely across the cheek.

“What if that hadn’t worked!” He blurted. “What if you had been a second slower, a fraction weaker! Reiner had a gun you idiot!” Eren rubbed his cheek and took Levi’s scolding in his stride.

“You’re an idiot, Eren Jaeger,” Jean agreed.

“Nobody asked you, Jean,” Eren whined.

“He’s not wrong,” Levi chided. How was their relationship supposed to work out if Eren was constantly, recklessly bounding through life?

“I’m sorry,” Eren said softly. A little more hopefully, he added, "It’s over.” Without relenting with his serious face, Levi gave Eren a long, reprimanding hug.

“Are you going to tell us what kind of place they’re headed to? What did you see behind the door?” Armin asked.

“Maybe later. Maybe not,” Eren said with a yawn, the day’s antics catching up to him. Armin looked disappointed to say the least.

“What a ridiculous holiday,” he groaned.

“Happy Thanksgiving!” Marco beamed. “I’m grateful we all worked together as a team to overcome our problems,” he said loudly and vaguely, trying to deter the stares of the suspicious patrons. “We are completely normal people,” he said, this time quietly and borderline bitterly.

Stepping closer, Mikasa looked like she wanted to slap Eren, too, but instead she just gave him a hard push on his shoulder.

“Thanks for saving us from whatever could have gone wrong, little bro,” she said. “I’m glad we didn’t lose you.” Armin nodded, mimicking Mikasa’s punch but much more softly.

“I knew he’d stay,” he smirked, looking at Levi pointedly, who felt his face heat up at the implication.

“Let’s go home and eat,” Jean urged. “And hopefully avoid getting caught for setting off homemade smoke bombs in downtown Rose.”

“It’s not the most illegal thing you’ve done, Jean,” Eren prodded. Marco’s eyebrows shot up to his hairline.

“Eren! Not in front of Marco, he’s innocent,” Jean whined.

“Now he has to know, though,” Levi said, trying not to laugh at the look of stress on Marco’s face.

“I can’t believe I married a felon without my knowledge,” Marco murmured.

“I’m not a felon!”

 

*

 

The park was full of people, crowding around the east-side entrance. Jazzy notes could be heard from down the street, filling the evening air with something bright like holiday cheer. 

Eren played the keys gently, slowly, as if he were in no rush to finish the song or even go home. As Levi watched him play, he thought to himself about how public pianos were set up by and because of people like him, people equal in their charisma and musical talent.

As his song came to a close, the crowd gave a glove-muffled applause and cheered for an encore.

“Sorry folks, that’s the last one,” Eren said with a sigh. “I can’t feel my fingers anymore, and I can’t play with gloves!” As evidence, he wiggled his stiff, gloveless fingers.

“I’ll warm them up for you!” Someone from the crowd shouted, earning laughter.

“Ah, sorry,” he apologized again. “I’ve got someone for that already,” he smiled, beckoning Levi from the crowd, who rolled his eyes and grabbed his hands.

“Jesus, they _are_ freezing,” Levi spluttered, instantly regretting his decision to flaunt that he was the one taking Eren home.

“You’re beautiful,” Eren hummed, leaning up to kiss Levi.

“Agh, your nose is cold, too!” Levi grumbled, dodging Eren’s advances. The thinning crowd laughed and Levi had forgotten they were there.

“My lips are cold, too, Levi. Help!” Eren said urgently, giggling. Levi sighed and leaned down to give Eren a peck on the lips, but he was pulled down to sit on the piano bench where Eren gave him a deep, searing kiss. Beyond the warm, bubbly feeling he felt in his chest and ears, he could hear a few whistles from their audience. Eren pulled back and looked at Levi with the most fond eyes, and sighed.

“Alright,” he said softly, turning back to the piano and splaying his hands across the keys. “Just one more.”

 

*

**Author's Note:**

> Potentially Useful/Useless Information/Footnotes:
> 
> *name taken from _There Beneath_ by The Oh Hellos. [_Dear Wormwood_](http://music.theohhellos.com/) is an album worth a listen!  
>  *This story is a combination of _Neverwhere, The Wind-Up Bird Chronicle_ , a story from my Japanese teacher, and a bit that Gabriel Garcia Marquez wrote about a Faun in the subway, I wanted to make something that was a little fantastical but still fixed in reality. It’s my first time writing something like this! I like how it’s turned out.  
> *Looking at a calendar, I realized that past and future Monday, November 25ths have and will have taken place during, 1996, 2002, 2013, 2019. I feel that this story is rooted in the moment of 2015 (but I needed the story to start on a Monday), so it’s up to you to place it where ever you feel is best (in case you need that sort of chronology-related closure)  
> *I have realized that Shari’s is a restaurant chain exclusive to the United States’ west coast. Shari’s is like a Denny’s where the pie is better and the service is slower  
> *Eren is indeed quoting someone when he says “We are all unfinished men and women”! It’s Carlos Fuentes! http://a1001nights.com/carlos-fuentes-how-i-started-to-write-4/ I feel like it’s very fitting, for both Eren and the plot, so I couldn’t help but borrow it.  
> *Of the languages I do speak, Italian is not one of them. Please let me know if I messed anything up!
> 
>  
> 
> Thank you so so much for reading my fic!!! I really loved writing Eren and Levi in love... thEY'Re iN LovE... !!! I am working on a brief epilogue, so you can expect that in a few weeks! What about all of our side characters in this story, right?? 
> 
> Much thanks to my best friends for beta'ing this, tumblr users [theoriesandfancies](http://theoriesandfancies.tumblr.com), [wordsandacuptoftea](http://wordsandacupoftea.tumblr.com), and [wallflowerfunction](http://wallflowerfunction.tumblr.com)!! Go check em out, follow em, shower em with praise!
> 
> If you have any questions about the fic please comment here or message me on tumblr!!! I'm at [tofuandnuts](http://tofuandnuts.tumblr.com/%20)
> 
> I have also crafted an 8tracks playlist for the fic as well if you are interested: [[here]](http://8tracks.com/rach1542/the-wind-the-leaves)
> 
> Thank you again!!! I'm so grateful!! \;0;/


End file.
